The Truth in the Development
by ProfeJMarie
Summary: You have to give a little to get a little . . . and perhaps a little bit more. Booth and Brennan investigate a murder and their friendship/partnership.  Post S06E11, but spoiler-free beyond that.
1. Chapter 1

_**Chapter 1**_

He leaned in close to her, like he had done dozens of times before. This time, he felt the potential impact of their proximity and gazed seriously into the grey-green eyes that held so much emotion and trust.

"Bones," he said quietly and with all of the conviction he could muster, "_now_ is our moment. Can you feel it? Let's not miss it this time. No regrets, right?"

She gave a slight tilt of her head and felt herself drawn into his warm, brown passion-filled eyes and decided she could indeed feel the moment. "No regrets," she agreed.

Booth's fingers gently brushed her hair back from her face and ended by cradling her face and neck as he moved in and took her lips into his own. It was a beautifully familiar feeling, yet yielded itself to a new tenderness and love that had not been present before. He broke away and their eyes swam together. He smiled. She returned with her own smile and snaked her hands up along his chest and around his neck as he pulled her close into him and they kissed each other again. This second kiss reflected a deep-seated passion, unleashing itself upon the knowledge that _this_ was their time, _this_ was the culmination of the realization that only she could fulfill his needs and desires and only he could do the same for her.

Booth's heart raced as they broke away. He wanted nothing more than to continue, but needed to make sure she heard the words loud and clear before they gave in to their physical demands.

"I love you, Bones. I tried so very hard to stop loving you, but I couldn't fight fate."

"I love you too, Booth."

**Wouldn't that be wonderful if it were that easy? **_**Sigh.**_** Sorry, that's not *quite* how this story goes…**

Brennan answered her phone, "Brennan."

"Hey Bones," came Booth's cheerful voice on the line.

"Booth, do we have a case?"

"Nope. Just thought maybe you wanted to, you know, have lunch together or something."

Brennan studied the set of remains in front of her as she considered his offer, attempting to determine whether or not she could finish reconstructing the skeleton in the time it took for Booth to come and pick her up.

"I'm sorry, Booth, but not today. I really need to finish this skeletal reconstruction in time for Angela to be able to help with identification."

"Well, alright," Booth said with a trace of disappointment. "How about dinner, then?"

"You seem intent on not eating alone. Perhaps you are trying to use me to replace the time you used to fill with Hannah?"

Was that guile? He shook his head to himself. It had been _weeks_ since breaking up with Hannah and she thought that _now_ was when he was feeling the absence? "Before Hannah, I seem to remember that I used to fill up almost all of my time with you when I could."

Brennan gave an involuntary smile at this unexpectedly straightforward response. She had to admit that she was rather enjoying how brazen and confident he had been lately and surprised herself by responding, "Sweets might say that you are now trying to resurrect our surrogate relationship and while I am not completely opposed to that idea, I really can't eat lunch with you today and I'm not sure about dinner, either. Why don't you try Cam or Sweets?"

_Surrogate relationship my ass_, Booth thought to himself. "You know what, Bones? Nevermind. I just thought it might be nice to have a meal with my _friend_, my _partner_, but if you're too busy getting all _psychological_, then have fun with that. I'll call you when we have a case." He shut his phone in mild irritation.

"Booth, I –" Brennan started, then realized he had ended the call. She felt a tinge of regret and considered whether or not to call him back. His "psychological" remark was enough to help her make the decision against returning the call. He was the one that usually agreed with Sweets and relied on his psychology to help them with their cases and now he conveniently didn't like it? She'd stay at the lab and proceed rationally, thank you very much.

An hour later, Brennan's phone rang again. Booth. "I haven't changed my mind, Booth, if that is why you were calling again," she answered testily.

Booth stifled a sigh. Bones might not be like most women, but she still knew how to hold onto a grudge. "No-o. I said I'd call when we had a case. And, as it happens, we have a case. I'll come pick you up," he responded, equally on edge. "That is, if you're not too _busy._"

"No," she responded calmly. "A potential homicide victim does indeed take priority over the subject I am working on currently. I'll be ready."

"Great, I'll see you in 20," he said in a reciprocal, if not slightly imposed, affable tone before hanging up.


	2. Chapter 2

_**Chapter 2**_

Booth pulled the SUV up to the Jeffersonian to find Bones waiting for him at the curb dressed and ready with her equipment. He hopped out and helped load her stuff into the back of the vehicle and returning to his seat, he pulled up a bag and handed it to her.

"What is this?"

"Lunch, Bones. I grabbed a couple of burritos from that all-natural place you like so much. Guess you're stuck helping me not eat alone after all." He threw her a wide grin.

She chuckled and opened the bag as he pulled away from the curb to head out to the crime scene. "Booth, there's only one burrito in here."

"Yeah, well, I ate mine already on the way here. I was starving," he said rubbing his stomach.

She rolled her eyes at him and remarked that this meant he did indeed eat alone, after all.

He shrugged his shoulders. "Potato, potahto – you're eating, you're here with me – and it's work-related so none of that 'filling in the empty spaces' psychobabble applies."

"You're not making any sense."

"Exactly my point, Bones." He gave her a smile, eyes twinkling. "Chop chop and eat up! The place isn't very far away – it's at the new development project. Construction workers were digging at the edge near the woods when someone saw the body fall into the dump truck from the shovel."

"I've seen the plans for that new construction; I am thinking of buying one of the new condominium units."

"Wait, what? What's wrong with your current place? You don't want to invest in that new development – it's going to be full of snobby lobbyists and other highbrow folks. They should be building for the rest of us everyday Joes."

"Actually, with our current economic conditions, building high end housing and developing the surrounding commercial support for it gives the economy a bigger boost than the ideological hopes that lower-priced housing will draw in residents who couldn't afford their original homes in the first place."

Booth sighed. "A fresh start, Bones. That's all people want, sometimes, is a fresh start."

"Buying a new home that they can't afford is not a very good way to go about that," she replied matter-of-factly.

"What about for someone like, me?"

"Are you thinking of moving? Because if you are, I have some very good ideas regarding places you could consider."

"No . . . I mean, hypothetically. What if I wanted the fresh start – the new place. What about developing housing units that _I_ could afford?"

Brennan shook her head. "Oh, _you_ couldn't afford what they're building there."

"Well, I _know_ that . . . just, nevermind."

"Is this an attempt to open up another discussion about the discrepancy between our own financial situations? I thought we had already established that it doesn't matter between us."

Pulling up to the construction site, Booth parked and looked over at her before getting out of the SUV. "No. You're right. We are _not_ talking about our own 'financial situations'. Unless it involves you buying us a 100'' plasma TV, we are definitely not talking about our personal economics."

She gave him a calculated expression that was tinged with perplexity. Booth gave her a smirk as he hopped out of the driver's seat, pleased with how he managed to slip the "us" into the comment. He strolled around to the back of the truck and helped her unload her gear.

They started making their way to where the construction crew and the local Metro police had gathered. "So, you don't like my place?" Booth asked.

"What? Of course I like your place. What do you mean?"

"Well, it's just that you were saying you had some ideas of where I could move so I figured that meant you thought I _should_ move."

"No. That's not what I meant at all. I like your place very much. It reflects you very well – an understated location, a bit old-fashioned, comfortable, and welcoming."

"Oh." He paused as his face scrunched into thought. He wasn't sure how much of her statement was actually complimentary. "What do you mean, 'old-fashioned'? I'm a modern kind of guy. I can even follow a lot of the fancy technobabble that Angela spouts out with her computer modeling… well, some of it…"

"You have an array of antique items throughout your apartment that you yourself have described as speaking to a simpler time. These items have parity with some of your old-fashioned views of the world such as your overly-protective nature of females, your insistence at being the one to fix things, and your persistent thinking that males should be the primary provider in a relationship."

"Those ideas aren't old-fashioned . . . well, maybe the last one a little bit, but—" Booth was interrupted by them reaching the forensic site.

The development area was in the beginning stages: temporary fencing, crew parking, directional signage, foreman's trailer, and a few trucks. A pair of Metro police officers was talking to a small gathering of crewmen. One of the officers turned as she saw Booth and Brennan approach and gave a big grin.

"Seeley Booth? Is that you? Look at you all hot-shotted up with the feds!"

"Kelly Nelson! Wow. How the hell are you?" They shook hands warmly.

"It's Kelly Gorman, now." Booth gave a nod and introduced his partner.

"This is my partner, Dr. Temperance Brennan. Bones, this is Kelly. She and I go way back. We went to school together in Philly."

Kelly and Brennan shook hands and Kelly started to introduce her partner, but Brennan interrupted, "Officer Pete Daniels. Yes, we've met before."

Both Daniels and Booth looked at her in surprise. "You remember me?" Daniels asked.

"Of course. We worked with you on the Patterson case last month."

Booth covered his own disbelief with a proud smile. "What?" Brennan asked.

Booth leaned in and whispered, "You usually don't take the time to remember the other people we work with, Bones. We're just kind of surprised, is all. But in a good way," he hurriedly added, noticing her frown.

"Where are the remains?" Brennan directed her question away from the current slant of the conversation.

"Right." Booth looked to Daniels and he led Brennan to the dump truck, which she scaled easily and disappeared beyond the rim of the bucket.

"So, you ever get married?" Kelly asked.

"Nah."

"You and Dr. Brennan . . . ?"

"Not yet."

Kelly raised an eyebrow at that response, followed by a laugh. "Still as cocky and confident as ever, hey Seeley?"

Booth just gave a smile and pulled out a pen and his notecards. Truth be told, as much as it seemed fun to run into her at first, Booth was now ready to move past that slippery slope and pressed into the business at hand and asked for a rundown of the situation. Construction on the site was only in its beginning stages and bulldozers were only just starting to clear away the first layer of ground and according to the crew, it was by a stroke of luck that they even happened to notice the remains at all as they fell from a shovel into the truck.

Booth made his way over to the truck and hopped on the bumper. "Bones, whaddaya got?"

Brennan was kneeling in the dirt, gently sifting around the remains, looking out for any obvious identifying objects to accompany her basic identification. She knew Booth was not going to like what she had already determined.

"Male. Based upon decomp and probable depth, I'd say he might have been dead for about two weeks, but Hodgins should be able to get much more specific than that."

"Just 'male'? That's all you got? Usually you have more . . ." He caught her expression and felt his stomach clench. "What? Since when do you hold back? He's a kid, isn't he." He gave this last comment as a statement rather than a question because he knew the answer she was going to give.

"I'd put him at about twelve or thirteen years old. Possible signs of physical abuse, but I won't know that for sure until I can examine him more closely. There's still a lot of flesh and some clothing for Cam and Hodgins to look over."

"How'd he die?"

"I can't be certain, but there is a mark on his occipital bone with an angle that would be difficult to occur without added force beyond a basic fall."

"So, a homicide?"

"Yes."

Booth sighed and told her he'd call it in. They could shunt it to Metro, but with the victim being a minor, it was an easy decision for the FBI to take point. Booth made the requisite calls to both the Bureau and the Jeffersonian and worked with the foreman to determine if and when they would be able to continue with their work.

As Booth continued to survey the area and wait for the forensics teams to arrive, Kelly suggested they get together for drinks to catch up.

Booth hesitated for a moment. "Yeah, give me a call sometime, we'll figure something out."

"What about tonight, Booth? She and her husband could join us for dinner." Brennan called out unexpectedly.

"Tonight? My husband's out of town, but I'm free after my shift." Kelly offered.

"Bones, I thought you couldn't make it to dinner tonight because of that other set of bones you were working on."

She shrugged. "They can wait. I'll have time tomorrow morning while I wait for Cam and Hodgins to get what they need from this set of remains. We can meet at the Fou-"

"How about that new sports bar and grill that opened over on L street?" Booth rapidly interrupted, avoiding Brennan's puzzled gaze.

Kelly smiled. "Sounds great. Nice to see you haven't changed much, Seeley."

Booth grinned, but felt uncomfortable with the sudden change of plans for the evening. "Catching up" was not really something he wanted to do. With the whole mess with Broadsky behind him, he felt that he had done enough catching up for awhile.

On the other hand, given that Brennan had only just that morning refused to have either lunch or dinner with him and was ending up doing both gave him cause to believe that the result, however convoluted, proved favorable.


	3. Chapter 3

_**Chapter 3**_

Once the remains and all surrounding evidence were secured and in transport to the Jeffersonian, Booth helped Brennan pack up her gear and he drove her back to the lab.

"You know, I'm sorry about the place I chose for dinner tonight. I know it's not really your kind of place. Probably the only vegetarian option will be salad."

"I imagine it will have similar choices as those available at the diner and the frequency with which we eat there should be evidence enough that I am satisfied with the menu. However, I do not understand why you did not want us to eat at the Founding Fathers."

"Because that's our hangout and I didn't want her to start showing up there hoping to 'run into' me after I failed to return her calls or tell her I'm busy."

"I don't understand why you invited her to call you sometime if you have no intention of actually talking to her."

"Give me a call 'sometime' or 'I'll' give you a call sometime is code for 'Don't call me because I really don't want to get together with you and catch up on 20 years and if I had wanted to know about your life all this time I would have stayed in contact with you in the first place."

Brennan raised her eyebrows at him. "That's really a lot of information to pack into a code line. Very impressive."

"Yeah, it's pretty good, right? Except it didn't work, did it?"

"This is true. Perhaps you need to teach me these code lines ahead of time so that I can adapt. Are there any code lines I should know about before we meet Kelly for dinner tonight?"

Booth smiled at her appreciatively. "I don't know. Maybe we should make up some of our own. What do you think?"

A glimmer came to her eyes and Booth found it difficult to pull his own eyes back to the road instead of getting caught inside the beautiful innocence that played behind that mischievous glint. "So, 'I'm thirsty for a cup of tea' could be code for 'I'd much rather have a glass of wine, but they don't serve decent wine at a sports bar so I will settle for a beer," she offered.

"Oh, I get it. You really _are_ actually mad about the restaurant choice and this is your way of telling me, huh?" he teased.

"Of course not. Perhaps I don't really understand how this code phrase works, after all."

"No, no – you know what? You're right. I like that one. That's good. And how about 'These french fries are great!' for 'I don't want to talk about this topic anymore so could you please bring up one of your random anthropology facts or other obscure trivia to change the subject in that great way that you do."

"You're the one who started this whole code line subject and now you want me to start talking about – _oh_," she widened her eyes as he gave her glance that she well recognized. She had missed the joke. "You don't want me to change the topic now . . .that's for the french fry code line. I understand." She couldn't help but return his crooked smile that made his eyes crinkle at her.

They pulled up to the front entrance to her building in the Jeffersonian complex. Booth helped her unload her gear from the back of the truck.

"I'm sorry that I am forcing you into a situation that you were trying to avoid," she said to him with chagrin.

"Look, there's nothing to be sorry about and nobody's forcing me to do anything. Besides," he said with a positive upswing and a gentle nudge, "we've got our code lines in case we need them, right?"

She just chuckled at him and shook her head.

"I'll pick you up at 6:30. Wear something green, if you can." Booth headed back around to the driver's side of the SUV and hopped in before she could ask him any questions.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Thoughts of the new case on his plate and the awkward evening ahead swirled his emotions in ways Booth did not care for. It wasn't like they hadn't dealt with kids before and it certainly wasn't unusual for these same kids to have been abused, but for some reason, this one gave him more of an uncomfortable feeling than usual and he couldn't quite put his finger on why. Then there was dinner. Maybe it wouldn't have seemed so weird if Kelly's husband was going to be there, too, but now she was probably going to want to walk down memory lane. He'd known Kelly since probably late elementary school years, but it wasn't until high school that they'd really hung out much. She'd been a cheerleader, which is naturally how they got to know each other better. Fortunately, he had never actually dated her.

As Brennan opened the door when he arrived later to pick her up, however, most of his unease fell away. She looked beautiful, as usual, and to his supreme pleasure, she had worn green in the form of a gauzy scarf over a royal blue knit shirt. The combination of the two colors caused her eyes to look greener than usual, causing him to catch his breath for a moment.

"Hey, Bones. You look fantastic," he told her while reaching out to run the scarf through his fingers. "I love the green scarf. It brings out the color in your eyes."

She gave him a demure smile and returned the gesture by straightening the collar on his leather jacket, unconsciously letting her hands linger as she got caught in his gaze, a gaze that made her feel like she belonged to him and him alone. He gave her another smile, one that crept across his face slowly and then took over his eyes. He suggested they get going.

"Do you know where we're going? Because I have the GPS in my car if you want me to drive."

Booth placed his hand along the small of her back as he gently guided her down the hall and said with a quiet confidence, "Don't worry, Bones. I know _exactly_ where we're going."

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Kelly was shorter, with short, wavy brown hair and wore a friendly smile while when they arrived at the restaurant, which flaunted typical sports bar ambience with athletic paraphernalia such as hockey sticks and pucks, catcher's gloves, and basketball jerseys as well as the requisite autographed photos, game programs, and a host of large, flat-screen televisions scattered throughout the building. A hostess led them to a table near the back. They settled in with menus and Brennan commented on the fact that there were many appetizing choices available and Booth needn't have worried.

The waitress came by to take their drink orders. When Brennan commented, "I'm thirsty for a cup of tea," Booth broke into a full out laugh, puzzling both the waitress and Kelly. He regained some decorum long enough to suggest beers for them, instead.

"That would do nicely," Brennan gave a little smirk to Booth.

"I feel like I'm missing out on something, here," Kelly remarked.

"Nah, it's nothing. So, how long have you been with Metro?" Booth moved them away from the slippery slope.

"Just a few months. I transferred in from upper Maryland because Ron, my husband, took a job with an architectural firm here in D.C, so we just figured all in all it'd be easier to live closer." Kelly talked more about what she did before becoming a cop, including having kids shortly after graduating from high school.

"Booth has a son, Parker, who's just about eleven years old now," Brennan volunteered.

"Aw, that's a nice age. You said you weren't married, what's the story there?"

Booth shrugged. "No story. I offered to marry her, she didn't want to, we share custody."

"Well, don't talk my ear off there, Seeley," Kelly joked with him as the waitress returned with their drinks and took their orders.

"So, the FBI? That seems like a far stretch from the jock I knew in school."

Brennan gave her a dubious look. "Booth says you were a cheerleader. I might suggest that based upon your assumption, your career choice is further from the mark than his."

Booth turned to Brennan, but before he could cover for her, Kelly laughed and replied, "Fair enough. You're the anthropologist, right? What connects a jock closer to law enforcement than a cheerleader?"

"Oh no, no, no," Booth interjected. "We're not going there – she's just going to talk about how athletes do this 'pretend warrior' thing and, well, I messed up my shoulder so I wasn't going to get anywhere. One thing led to another and here I am."

"I was not going to talk about pretending to be a warrior. You know my thoughts on that. Instead I was merely going to mention that athletes, while they earn an undeserved elevation of status, as a result still take on a leadership role both within the team structure and without it. A role within the FBI necessitates leadership qualities, which you clearly possess."

Booth stifled a full out grin. "Thanks, Bones."

Kelly gave Booth a knowing smile. "I see what you mean about the 'not yet' comment."

"Hey! Look, here's our food. It looks and smells great. Doesn't it look great?" Booth said gratefully as the waitress returned with their food, including one of the restaurant's specialty giant Rice Krispy bars, wrapped in Saran-Wrap, for Booth to bring home for Parker.

Inevitably, they spent some time talking over the case, sharing early ideas for what could have happened. Booth and Kelly immediately suggested foster child or runaway, but the location of the victim's remains created a mystery of what happened. Brennan bristled at the mention of the victim being a foster child, but could not logically refute their hypothesis.

To combat the direction of their conversation, Brennan started a new line of questioning by inquiring about Kelly and her family. Kelly in return had plenty of questions for the anthropologist, making Booth especially happy that he had brought her along. Kelly asked if Booth had been back in town recently and when he shook his head she mentioned that she had gone back a couple of years ago and happened to catch the big Michael Jackson tribute they had.

"Remember trying to figure out the Moonwalk?"

"I remember the dance team trying to put together a whole routine to his moves," Booth chuckled.

"And I remember that you probably were helping Carrie Rogers with that routine." Kelly teased him. Booth's eyes twinkled as he bit into his burger.

"So did you and Booth have sex while you were in high school?" Brennan asked, causing Booth to nearly spit out his food.

"Bones!"

Kelly, of course, took it in stride. "Do you mean with each other?" She laughed. "No. But don't think I didn't want to."

"These fries are great, Bones, you should try some." Booth interjected quickly.

Brennan caught Booth's eye and glancing at his plate, she commented, "The pattern in your ketchup reminds me of Dr. Hodgins' most recent acquisition in the lab. He has a collection of dipluridae, which is a species of spider most common in the tropics."

"I bet Cam has been keeping her distance," Booth smirked gratefully. Brennan had launched into their first code line at the beginning of the evening, but wasn't sure if she would have remembered the one he really cared about.

"How did the ketchup pattern remind you of spiders?" Kelly wanted to know. Brennan began to explain the tunnel shape she saw and how dipluridae spin webs in the same manner under rocks and in other crevices. Booth's phone rang, and seeing who it was from, excused himself to take the call.

"Booth gets a little skittish talking about sex. I don't know why that is," Brennan commented.

"He's just not a kiss-and-tell kind of guy. You know, in high school he was kind of one of 'those' guys, but when you talked to him or hung around him you figured out pretty quickly he wasn't _really_ one of those guys, you know?"

Brennan furrowed her brow, confused by the circuitness nature of her reflection. "No."

"He was popular and got a lot of attention because he was star athlete and, of course, charming, you know? But he didn't use that to get in the sack with the girls or anything. I mean, he was the one always looking out for everybody. His brother – now _he_ was one of 'those' guys. Seeley was always taking flak for him. I always got the idea that their parents were pretty hard on them, although, I think they were living with their grandfather by that time."

Brennan was a little uncertain if she should ask her next question, but plunged ahead anyhow. "Did you know his parents?"

"Not really. Back when we were a bit younger I remember seeing his dad once, at a school thing and feeling kind of sorry for Seeley. His dad was a real piece of work."

Brennan felt an all too familiar tug on her heart as Booth came back to the table. He caught her expression and eyed them both nervously. "What did I miss? Wait . . . what did she tell you?" he asked, looking at Brennan.

Brennan smiled reassuringly, "Nothing I didn't already know. Who was on the phone?"

Booth's expression became serious. "Cam. They've got an ID of the body. It's a kid who lived up the street from Rebecca and Parker." The uncomfortable feeling he had earlier came rushing back and transformed itself into a full knot.


	4. Chapter 4

_**Author's Note: In my last chapter, I think I may have accidentally advanced Parker's age by too many months, by stating him as "almost 11" – when he really should probably be just under 10-1/2? I based this upon him being 4 at Christmas during Season 1, then also taking into account that we have the 7-month time jump with the Maluku/Afghanistan thing, as well as this story taking place some time after the sniper arc (whenever that would end, which is still nebulous at the time I write this, especially being spoiler-free and all). So, although it does not make much difference overall, I like to be as accurate as possible. **___

_**Chapter 4**_

The drive back to Brennan's apartment was subdued. They were both a bit thrown about the fact that this victim was in some ways, very close to home. Booth had told Brennan that he didn't think Rebecca and Parker knew the family all that well, but he remembered her telling him about how they had lost another son to leukemia two or three years earlier and saw them all even less than before.

"Losing a child . . . that can really mess up a family, you know, Bones? Some families, if they're lucky, become closer. Other families don't survive it." His voice had trailed off at that point as he had realized that this was precisely what had happened to Marcus Travers, the victim, and his family – except in the most extreme manner possible.

Marcus' father, Kenneth, had apparently filed a report with Metro two and a half weeks ago, charging his wife with kidnapping their son. Cam didn't have much more information than that, figuring Booth would do his own investigation into the file.

"Do you ever worry that Rebecca will do that with Parker? Take him away?"

"What? No. _No._ Why would you say such a thing?" Booth asked in bewilderment.

"It seems like she has withheld time with him from you before. And look at the Christmases where she has simply taken him on trips without allowing you a say."

"That . . . that's different, okay? I do stupid things sometimes and she's just saying stuff to get me to realize it."

"So what if you do something _really_ stupid and she decides that she needs to keep Parker away from you once and for all?"

"_Bones._ Don't even say such a thing! Rebecca's not like that. She wouldn't do that. I'm a _good father._ She wouldn't do that."

She watched his jaw clench, his grip tighten around the steering wheel, and thought about how he was repeating himself. She reached over and gave his arm a gentle squeeze. "You _are_ a good father. You're right. I didn't mean . . . I guess I'm just trying to understand why parents do things like this. I am continually baffled by the range of stupid things that parents do. It's not rational."

Booth shared a brief look with her, understanding, of course, where her words and emotions were coming from. "Parents aren't always rational when it comes to their kids, that's true. Love has its own rules, remember? Besides, what we see in our line of work is not usually parents acting out of love for their children, but a whacked out sense of revenge or anger. Remember the Bartlett case? That guy didn't take his kid out of love for him. He did it out of anger toward his ex-wife."

"So why, when Rebecca is angry with you, are you so sure she wouldn't take Parker away from you? What makes her different? Why wouldn't she take him away to get back at you?"

He didn't answer right away, causing Brennan to worry that she had pushed too far. When she glanced at him, however, he didn't look angry. Rather, he appeared almost defeated. "I don't know," he said quietly. "I guess I just kind figure she's always just blowing off steam whenever she's made the threats . . ." He swept away the uncertain expression and said with finality, "She just wouldn't do that."

His uncertainty made Brennan want to ask him more questions, but she understood his final tone and the look that he gave her that did not convey anger, simply a need for the conversation to be over. He'd dropped her off and thanked her for coming to dinner with him.

She tilted her head and smiled. "I think it might have been the other way around."

He reached for her hand and surrounded it with his own for a moment. "Maybe, but it sure felt like _you_ were with _me_." He held her eyes with his own for so long that Brennan hardly realized that she was holding her breath until she felt the warmth leave her hand and he was telling her that he'd stop by the lab first thing in the morning.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Booth caught up with the Jeffersonian team early the next morning at the lab. He joined Cam in the autopsy room, first, as she was still gleaning all she could from the remaining flesh before allowing Brennan and Clark to fully examine the bones. He found Brennan in there as well, hovering impatiently.

"Booth! Oh thank God you're here. Please, please tell me that you are here to take Brennan out with you into the field."

Booth chuckled as Brennan scowled at her. "You said you were almost finished."

"I am," Cam replied peevishly. "But even just these last few minutes have slowed way down because you are crowding me."

"Do you have anything that narrows down time of death?" Booth interceded.

Cam nodded. "Hodgins said insect or bug or . . . whatever activity indicated 13 days ago. He's analyzing what remained of the clothing and pulling whatever particulates he can."

"I pulled the full file on the missing person/abduction report and it seemed pretty scarce of useful information," Booth updated them. "Few leads at all. In fact, it's oddly sketchy. Something's not right about the whole thing. I mean, if the mother kidnapped her son, and he's dead, then—"

"Where is the mother?" Brennan finished for him and gave him an appraising look. "What are you thinking?"

Booth shook his head. "I don't know. What if we should be looking for another set of remains? What if she didn't try to kidnap Marcus? I've already ordered a forensics team to re-visit the development site to search for another possible set of remains."

"Have you talked to Rebecca or Parker, yet?" Brennan asked.

Booth brought the file in his hands close into his chest, crossing his arms and leaning back on a leg. "No. I've still gotta go talk to the father and break the news to him and see if I can't get more information about this whole mess."

"I'd like to come with you."

"Bones, are you sure? Cam said she's just about done –"

"And Dr. Edison is quite capable of handling the next step." She couldn't quite explain why she felt so strongly about joining him for this step except that she felt like he was going to need her as much as possible during this investigation, especially if last night was any indication.

"Yeah, of course. Let's go."

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Kenneth Martin worked at a corporate accounting firm and had seemingly worked his way up enough to escape the cubicles as the main receptionist escorted Booth and Brennan back to his office. Booth introduced himself and Brennan.

"Is this about my son? Have you found him? Did you arrest my wife?" When he paused enough to look at their faces, though, he knew the truth. "He's dead, isn't he?" His shoulders sagged.

Booth gave a slight nod. "I'm sorry, sir, but yes."

"Karen. She finally did it, didn't she? She went too far and killed him. Where is she?" Martin had unconsciously advanced toward them with his accusatory tones and Booth put a gentle, but firm hand on his chest to bring him back to the situation at hand.

"Karen is your wife? We do not know where she is or if she is involved in any way. Mr. Martin, have you had any contact with either her or Marcus since you reported them missing?"

"No, of course not. Don't you think I would have gone to the police if I had? Then maybe it wouldn't have been too late. Where is my son? I'd like to see him."

"I understand your need to see him, but I'm afraid that won't be possible just yet," Brennan told him.

"I don't understand. Why can't I see him? What's going on?"

"Mr. Martin, what gives you reason to believe that your wife might have harmed Marcus?" Booth sidestepped the questions with his own.

Martin sighed and sat back on the edge of his desk. "A social worker made a surprise visit to our house the day before Marcus went missing, suspecting that one of us had been abusing him. Marcus had told me that he had gotten in a fight with a kid at school – it had been happening a lot lately, but then I noticed how both Marcus and Karen reacted when the social worker was talking and I began to think . . ." his voice hitched, " . . . I started thinking maybe there was some truth to it all." He continued by telling them that he and his wife argued that night, she had denied everything, but then neither one returned from work or school the next day. "Now can you please tell me why I can't see my son?"

Brennan looked at Booth, who gave her the go-ahead nod. "We found your son's remains within the boundaries of a new construction development site. His body has undergone extensive decomposition and we are still investigating the full causes of his death."

Booth offered a couple of final questions regarding ideas of why Marcus would be in that area and possible locations for his wife. And finally asked – simply as a formality, Booth assured – about Martin's whereabouts the day of Marcus' death. They thanked him for his time and said they would keep him updated on the investigation.

Walking into the elevator to head back down and out of the building, Booth stuck his hands in his pockets and leaned on his shoulder against one of the walls. Brennan watched him as he seemed to be working through the information they had just acquired from Marcus' father. She thought of their conversation last night and how this situation was nothing at all like the one she posited about Rebecca.

"This isn't the same situation between you and Rebecca at all," she said aloud.

Booth looked up in confusion. "What?"

"I mean, Rebecca wouldn't ever hurt Parker and then kidnap him in that way."

Booth peered at her in continued puzzlement. "Of course she wouldn't. What are you talking about?"

"Last night. I basically made an erroneous comparison between this situation and the one with you and Rebecca. But Rebecca is not abusing Parker."

Booth gave a revelatory expression as he figured out what she was alluding to. He gave a smile. "I know, Bones. Don't worry about it. Besides," his face became more serious, "Karen Martin wasn't abusing Marcus, either."

By then they were almost back to Booth's SUV as Brennan made an incredulous noise. "Now, how do you know that?"

He hopped into the truck, started it up, and said, "Well, I could just say I saw it in his eyes, but you'll want more than that, so first of all, he was jumping all over the idea that his wife killed his son, but did you see any shock or rage there?" He answered for her with his own shake of his head. "Nope. Just this assumption. Plus, there is nothing in the police report about suspected abuse. Why wouldn't he report that to the police?"

"Do you suspect him?"

"He's our best bet so far, especially since he's probably the one who was hitting his kid in the first place. There's a whole lot hinky with this guy. We'll check out his alibi, but at least we have a much bigger ring of people to question, now."

"Do you think he was abusing their younger son, too, before he got sick?"

"I don't know," Booth replied sadly. "Maybe this guy has always been an asshole. Or maybe he was a good guy who couldn't handle his son's death. People can change in all kinds of bad ways."

"Not you," Brennan asserted.

He glanced at her briefly, uncertain. "What do you mean?"

"You have fundamentally remained the same since you were young. Kelly said even back in high school you were looking out for people. Not everyone has to change in a bad way just because bad things have happened to him. I'd like to think that I haven't changed like that in spite of my experiences."

"You haven't," Booth agreed rapidly, sincerely. "You couldn't possibly change like that, Bones. Your heart's too big. We are all more than the sum of our experiences. And don't tell me I'm not adding correctly, because my math is good on this. I know what I'm talking about."

She wanted to tell him that the sum of all parts is a whole, nothing more, nothing less. She wanted to tell him that her heart was the correct proportional size in her body. But given how he had just proved to her that she was right – that Kelly was right – in how he turned her words around on her, she could not refute that _his_ math, while not the generally accepted math, was absolutely correct.


	5. Chapter 5

_**Chapter 5**_

Booth ended up bringing Brennan back to the lab to drop her off so that she could start gathering her own evidence to help them move forward with the case as he returned to the Hoover to pull as much background information as he could for their interview list that afternoon.

Hinky, Booth felt, was a major understatement to describe Kenneth Martin. Lies had been oozing out of that guy and he would gladly have pulled him into an interrogation room, but they'd only just begun and didn't have much at all to go on. He paged through police reports that showed dead ends everywhere. Karen's vehicle wasn't missing, Karen's colleagues at the bakery she worked at couldn't recall her acting any different than usual in the days leading up to her disappearance, no one seemed to have seen a mother and son pairing that matched their descriptions, no credit card activity – nothing. He wanted to get inside Martin's house with Sweets, but felt they would get further if they went there with more evidence to guide them and give them more cause to poke around.

As he made a few more calls and drew up a plan for who they would interview that afternoon, he resisted the urge to call Brennan to see if she wanted to meet for lunch. He knew that she wouldn't want the break until he was ready to take her out to talk with potential witnesses and suspects, but it was hard not to check up on her. He worried about her with these kinds of cases. He knew, for example, that she did not like it when he and Kelly speculated that the victim was a foster child and then she started that whole talk about changing based upon past experiences.

He had to admit that he felt worried she was slipping into the trap, again, regarding her open heart. But, when she didn't contradict him about people equaling more than the sum of their experiences, he relaxed. They were right on track, right? Same page? The time was just about right to move them forward and that thought caused a ridiculous grin to spread across his face. There was no way he was going to let them slip into status quo. The time was right, he could feel it.

He pushed through the urge to call and check on her; he didn't want to risk purposely irritating her in this way right now. Plenty of time for irritating her in other ways later.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

An hour later he gave Brennan a call to check on her progress only to find her walking through his door carrying a small brown sack.

"Hey, what are you doing here? I was just calling you."

"I knew you would be anxious to get out again and since we've made some progress with some evidence and the victim's remains, I thought I would attempt surprising you while saving you time from having to pick me up."

Booth gave a boyish smile, "Well, you surprised me, alright. What's in the bag?"

Brennan took her turn to allow a shy and nervous smile to flit across her face. "Lunch. I assumed you might have worked through it like me. So, as part of the surprise, I brought lunch for you like you did for me yesterday. Unlike you, however, I waited to eat mine so that we could actually eat it together. Perhaps we can discuss our findings while we eat?"

Booth's smile grew to a full grin as he came around from his desk and closed the distance between them. "You brought me lunch? Wow." He dug into the bag and opened up the sandwich. "Philly steak and cheese? I could kiss you." He paused and met Brennan's eyes for a moment and loved what he saw flash through them, but knew he should ramble on through this moment. "Except not yet. I'm too hungry." He smirked and went to sit down at one of the armchairs near the door.

"So, what have you found out so far? Do we have a firm cause of death? A murder weapon?"

"After a cursory examination of the bones, I feel confident that the blow to the occipital bone is indeed the cause of death. Hodgins and Dr. Edison are working on matching a possible murder weapon, but right now it almost appears to be like a spear or perhaps a small shovel."

"Maybe one of those small shovels people use for gardening?" Booth offered.

"A trowel. Yes, that could fit what we've examined so far. What brings you to that possible conclusion so quickly?"

Booth shrugged. "I'm still liking Martin for this. And I'm not ruling out the mom. I'm just thinking of what might be hanging around in a garage or tool shed. Hodgins have any of his dirt or weird bug stuff to help us out, yet?"

Brennan stifled a smile at Booth's reference to particulate evidence, mostly because she felt the same way about Hodgins' research, even if she recognized how valuable it always was. She told him that he was still sifting through the dirt from the dump truck and had not yet run into anything distinctive. Additionally, he had just begun analyzing all that they could scrape from the fatal injury and hoped to know more that afternoon.

"Angela is trying to reconstruct some scraps of paper that appeared to be with Marcus' clothing and Cam found trace evidence of the streptococcus bacteria in some of the flesh."

"Wait, the strep throat thing? What does that tell us?"

"Maybe nothing other than that he was ill just before his death. But Cam feels that she can run a culture on it and perhaps gage a timeframe from it."

"Meaning, maybe he saw a doctor. Okay, well, we've got all kinds of routes to go with this now. But I want to go to his school and talk to some of his teachers. I have a feeling one of them may have made the call to Child Protective Services and that will make talking with the social worker easier." He balled up his sandwich wrapper and launched it into the trash basket then shrugged on his suit jacket.

They made their way to Booth's SUV and started on a somewhat familiar route to the middle school that Marcus had attended. It was the same middle school that Parker would attend in a couple of years. He still was not sure how or when he would talk to Parker and Rebecca about Marcus, although surely they would probably here about it that afternoon and contemplated whether he should contact Rebecca first and decided he'd call right after they talked to the teachers.

Their arrival in the school office prompted the secretary to immediately deduce the subject of their investigation and she asked if they had any new information about Marcus Martin. Booth simply asked if they could speak with the principal.

Booth broke the news to the principal and asked about Marcus' behavior record at which point the principal called in his associate principal who had primarily interacted with Marcus as a result of fighting with other students. From the associate principal they learned that Marcus' record had been clean coming into the middle school and guessed that he was probably acting out in a typical adolescent response to heavy stress from home. Brennan asked if they knew that Marcus had been physically abused. Neither had any suspicions, but they directed the investigative team to one of the counselors.

The counselor revealed that she knew that one of the teachers had recently brought up that she thought there might be abuse at home and the counselor had reminded her that they were mandatory reporters.

"What led her to suspect Marcus was being physically abused?" Brennan asked.

"Apparently Marcus had been wincing and protecting his mid-section one morning and Ms. Arrington asked him about it. Marcus kind of blew her off, but then he later got into a fight with another student."

"I don't understand the connection," Brennan said.

"I do," Booth nodded, but did not explain. "Was there a student he fought with more often than others?"

"Yes. It was almost always with Oscar Fenton." The counselor looked at Booth, worried. "You don't think Oscar had anything to do with Marcus' death or disappearance? He's kind of an angry kid, but I don't think—"

"Could we just get his address, please?"

"Yes, of course."

They interviewed as many of Marcus' teachers as they could, but did not gain much more useful information. Julie Arrington, the teacher that had reported the suspected abuse, talked more about different comments that Marcus would make that seemed odd to her, and coupled with the pain and the fights, she felt concerned enough to make the call. She agreed that Booth could reference her when speaking with the social worker involved with the case.

"The counselor told us that most fights Marcus got into were with Oscar Fenton?"

Julie sighed. "Yes. Those two seemed to have an intense thing. It was almost like a love-hate relationship. They could be best buddies one moment and then one them would say something that would just set the other one off. It was crazy. Is it true? Was Marcus in an abusive environment?"

"Yeah," Booth said gently. "Yeah. You did the right thing." Julie seemed relieved, but filled with sad regret at the same time.

Booth thanked the teacher and he and Brennan managed to slip out of the school just before classes let out for the day and as they got back into the SUV, Brennan asked Booth what was significant about Marcus getting into a fight after complaining of pain. He started the car and was happy to have the driving to distract him for this conversation.

"The injury to his stomach was probably from whatever happened at home and then the fight was to cover it up. If I had to guess right now, I'd say Oscar knew what was going on and helped Marcus out. Maybe they were even helping each other out."

"That sounds like a pretty terrible way to help each other. If Oscar knew about what was happening, why wouldn't he tell someone?"

"If Oscar's helping Marcus out by fighting with him, Oscar ain't got much going on for him at home either, I'd bet."

He could feel rather than see Brennan's gaze on him as she asked her next question. "Did you have a friend that helped you out?"

He held his breath and clenched his jaw. He chanced a quick sideways glance at her and caught the soft, open expression on her face. Wasn't he just telling himself that the time was right with her? The question was whether or not the time for _this_ conversation was right. He didn't know if he was ready for this. He hated the idea of this conversation. Absolutely hated it.

"Bones, I—" His phone interrupted him. "Booth," he answered. "Rebecca? Whoa whoa whoa, slow down. What happened? . . . What? . . But he's okay? . . . Yeah, yeah, I'll be right there."

"What is it?" Brennan asked him. He seemed suddenly jittery.

"It's Parker. They're at the emergency room."


	6. Chapter 6

_**Chapter 6**_

"What is it?" Brennan asked him. He seemed suddenly jittery.

"It's Parker. They're at the emergency room." He tried to make his voice calm, because it wasn't a life or death situation, but still made his heart race. "Parker, he uh, was riding his bike and fell and broke his arm."

Brennan gave him a reassuring look. "I'm sure you must be worried, but it is a common injury from bike falls. I'm sure the doctors have given Parker medication to help with the pain."

"Yeah . . . yeah. I know, you're right. I was just hoping I wouldn't break him already."

"Booth? He fell while riding his bike. It's not your fault."

"What? I know that."

"You just said you were hoping that you wouldn't break him already. But you didn't. It was just an accident."

"Right. I meant . . .I was hoping _he_ wouldn't break already. That's all. I know. Kids break bones. It happens." He looked at her for more reassurance. "Right?"

Her eyes softened soothingly. "Right."

"Look, I, uh, know you should probably get back to the lab so that you can keep working the case, but, do you think you could come with me to the hospital, just for a little bit? You know, take a look at his X-rays and make sure it's not too bad of a break?"

"Dr. Edison is more than capable of continuing without me right now. Of course I will come with you."

Some of the tension rolled off of his shoulders as he realized how much it meant to him to have her come with him to the hospital, and not just for the X-rays. Sure, having her expert eye would certainly set his mind at ease, but more importantly, her presence simply calmed and encouraged him. He knew that his son was probably okay. Heck, he imagined Parker was already thinking to how cool it would be to show off his cast, but it still rattled him to get the "hospital" call. With Bones by his side, he felt more confident about the whole situation. He'd probably start babbling once he got there and even though he still couldn't predict when she would say something off the wall, more often than not, what she told people turned out to be exactly right. Plus, Parker thought she was cool. And with that thought, the tense frown curved unexpectedly into a small smile.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

They checked in at the desk, put on their guest stickers, and made their way to Trauma Room 2. Parker's face lit up when they opened the door. "Dad! Bones!"

"Hey buddy. How are you doing, pal?" Booth ruffled Parker's hair and gave him a kiss on his forehead.

Parker gave a small shrug. "It still kind of hurts, even after they gave me some medicine, and we've been here _forever_, but mom says I'll probably get to choose the color I want for the cast so I was thinking orange and black for the Flyers, but then she said they probably can't do two colors and now I don't know which one to choose. What do you think?"

"Orange, definitely orange. You wanna know why?"

"Why?"

"Because then you can still have all of your friends sign it and we can put the Flyers' logo on it with black marker, right?"

Parker grinned and nodded. "Yeah, cool." They exchanged a fist bump.

Booth looked up at Rebecca, who answered his unasked questions. "He was practicing some fancy jump on his bike and broke most of his fall with his wrist. The doctor said it was a pretty clean break and shouldn't need to wear the cast more than six weeks, maybe as little as four."

Brennan was already examining Parker's arm through the splint and agreed. "Booth asked me if I would look at the X-rays, but just by looking at it now, it seems that it is the distal radius that has been fractured, though I cannot determine how severe the fracture is."

"Seeley, can I talk to you a second?" She gestured to the hall.

"Yeah, of course." He turned to Parker and assured him that Brennan would hang out with him while he talked to his mom.

Rebecca launched into a babble as soon as they closed the door. "I swear he was wearing all of the protective gear, but he's just so into trying out the stunts and he went off of a ramp he and his friends made and I know I should have been better about telling him that he shouldn't have been trying that stuff out –"

"Hey, hey, hey. Rebecca." Booth held her shoulders and looked her straight in the eyes. "Calm down. It's okay. It's not your fault. Nobody's blaming you, alright?"

She let him pull her into his embrace. "I was so scared. I mean, he's just our little boy, right?"

"Yeah, I know." He released her and she took a deep breath to calm herself further.

"Okay, so here's the other thing. The doctors are saying Parker should stay home from school tomorrow, just to make sure he's taking things easy and avoiding possible complications, but I have to be in court and I'd ask for a continuance, but the case has already been delayed and—"

"I got it. You need me to take Parker. Of course, I will. I'll take him home with me after he's all set here."

"You're not in the middle of a case or anything? I assumed that's why Dr. Brennan was with you."

"Yeah, we are, but it's okay. We'll figure it out. Actually," he paused, not really feeling like this was the best time to bring it up, but not seeing a good alternative, "I wanted to talk to you about our case. It's about Marcus Martin."

Rebecca's face fell as Booth gave the bare facts of the case and asked if she and Parker had ever gotten to know them better recently. "No. God, we had only barely met them before Christopher got sick and then . . . well, they all just sort of folded in on themselves. We'd run into them from time to time and they all just seemed so tightly wound. So sad, really. And you still haven't found Karen?" Booth shook his head and she asked, "So, do we tell him now or later, do you suppose?"

Booth opted for later, figuring the hospital was stressful enough. He said he'd figure out a way to have a conversation with him later that night at his place. However, upon re-entering his room, Parker asked, "Is it true, Dad? That Marcus is dead?"

Booth looked with wide eyes at Brennan who merely replied, "He asked what we were working on together today. I didn't see the harm in breaking the news to him for you. You have enough to worry about right now."

"Dad, don't be mad. You and mom never tell me anything. I can handle it. And if anyone can figure out what happened to him, you guys can."

Booth sighed and gave Bones a little nod of a appreciation and assured Parker that they were going to figure out exactly what happened to him. Before they could continue the conversation, a nurse came in and told them that they were ready to fit up Parker for his cast. Brennan asked if she could look at Parker's X-ray and with Booth and Rebecca's approval, the nurse called up the images on the computer. Brennan pointed out the bone compression and called it a "torus" or "buckle" fracture. She assured the worried parents that it was an extremely common fracture and should heal up quite satisfactorily.

The nurse helped Parker settle into a wheelchair and Brennan suggested she stay behind so it wouldn't be too crowded. She wanted to check in with the team at the lab, anyhow. Rebecca, Parker, and the nurse exited the room, but before Booth followed them he took a hold of his partner's hand and kissed the backs of her fingers. "Different sort of kiss that I was thinking of earlier, but same kind of feeling. Thanks for being here, Bones."


	7. Chapter 7

_**Chapter 7**_

Parker returned with a grin that only a 10-year old could have after getting fitted for a cast. "Look, Bones! It's totally Flyers orange. Cool, huh? Dad says we can stop by your lab tomorrow and ask Angela to draw the logo on it. Do you think she'll do it?"

Brennan smiled. "That sounds exactly like something Angela would do. I bet I can show you some bones that look like yours, too. Speaking of the lab," Brennan looked up at Booth, "I should get back. Dr. Edison has finished cleaning the bones and I'd like to help examine them so that we can give you more information to help with the investigation."

Booth agreed to drop her off at the lab and they said good bye to Rebecca, who told Booth that she could pick up Parker at the end of the day tomorrow. They got Parker cleared to leave and they loaded up into the truck to drop off Brennan and then headed back to Booth's apartment.

Both boys agreed that ordering pizza was definitely the best route to go and settled in on the couch in the living room with the box inbetween them. Seeing Parker in such good spirits put Booth at ease and he asked Parker what kind of stunt he was trying out that ended so badly.

"Promise not to tell Mom?"

Booth chuckled and shook his head. "Nope, sorry buddy, can't make that promise. How about I just promise not to be mad?"

Parker screwed up his face in disappointment, but decided to tell him anyway. "I was trying to do an X jump. You know, you go off a jump, then twist your handlebars all the way around and back again. Only, I didn't have time to do the whole thing so I couldn't make a very good landing. I think we need a bigger jump."

"Oh ho ho, no way. Jumping with only concrete below you? At least at some of those bike parks it's on dirt, which is a lot softer, right?"

"I bet you did stuff like this when you were my age, though, huh?"

"Doesn't mean it was smart. Besides, I'd get into a whole mess of trouble more than you are right now. I promised I wouldn't get mad, so maybe you can promise me that you'll be smart about this stuff. Deal?"

"Yeah, deal."

Booth involuntarily thought about how quickly he stopped doing things like that after Jared got banged up from them just doing wheelies. His dad made sure he knew whose fault it would be every single time.

"Dad?" Parker, thankfully, pulled him from going too far down that road.

"What?"

"Do you miss Hannah?"

Where did that come from? "Not anymore. I did at first, you know? But nah. I don't miss her so much now. What about you? Do you miss her?"

"I guess not. We didn't do that much together, so it's cool that you're not together with her anymore. I think you should get back together with Bones."

Booth gave him a crooked smile and decided not to correct him about the "get back" part. For all a young Parker saw, it probably did seem like they had been together before. "You know what? I'm working on that, pal. I think I've got a shot; what do you think?"

"Totally. She really liked it when you kissed her hand in the hospital. I could tell because it looked like the same thing I see on girls' faces when I want to fast-forward through those parts on TV shows."

Booth laughed and enjoyed that warm feeling that stole over him hearing about Parker's observations. "So, what do you think? Is she ready for me to ask her out on a date?"

Parker rolled his eyes. "Duh. But I think you should do something cool and not just take her to dinner and movie like all of Mom's dates do. You could go to a museum or something. I bet she'd like that."

Booth worked to hide his smirk and nodded. "Yeah, I don't know about a museum, but you're right. I should think of something different."

"So, when are you going to ask her? I think you should ask her tomorrow when we go see Angela."

"You sure you don't just want me to start dating Bones so you can swim in the pool more often?"

"We-ell, kind of. But Bones is cool, too. So that's a good reason, though, right?"

Booth held up his fist and Parker bumped it with his own. "Yeah, buddy, that's definitely a good reason. Thanks, pal."

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

The next morning Booth outlined his plan for what he could get accomplished while still being able to hang out with Parker. First, he made a couple of phone calls. He started with local homeless shelters and women's' shelters for the possibility of seeing either Marcus or Karen, or both together. One location indicated a chance that they might have seen the pair just before Marcus' death, but most locations gave him the unsurprising answer that they couldn't possibly narrow down anything without a visual. Booth agreed to have his office send over photos to assist.

Next Booth called Sweets to ask him to stop by Kenneth Martin's residence in order to get a feel for the guy. "You know, do your thing and start developing a psychological profile of him."

"You believe he might be responsible for Marcus' death?"

"I don't know. That's why I want you to go there and kind of poke around. I'd go, but I'm home with Parker and the more I think about it, I think it's a better idea if you go – and maybe take Angela with you. She's pretty good at seeing stuff others miss and I want to know more about Karen. Between you and Angela and no actual agents, we might get something that will help me bring this guy in more easily for questioning."

Sweets asked after Parker and Booth gave him an update as well before continuing to give him as much information about Martin and what they knew so far about Marcus. Booth imagined Martin would be home this morning, now that he knew for sure about what happened to his son. They agreed to meet up at the lab just after lunch. His final call was to the office to coordinate the transfer of the photos to the shelters and calls to find out possible clinic information for Marcus so he could follow up on Cam's information about the strep throat bacteria.

With some of his own work out of the way, he rubbed his hands together and gave Parker a grin. "Ready for some _Battleship_ action?"

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

It was with mild apprehension that Kenneth Martin allowed Sweets and Angela into his home, which rang, of course, the first warning bell in Sweets' head.

"We appreciate you letting us take a look at Marcus' room. Oftentimes it really helps us gain some insights and sometimes can even give us some clues to help us find out what has happened."

"I told your Agent Booth, already, that this is Karen's doing," Martin said impatiently. "I don't see how snooping around Marcus' room is going to help you find Karen."

"Actually, you might be surprised at how much can be revealed about other family members through someone's personal space."

"We'll try not to take long, Mr. Martin," Angela cut in. "And we will leave everything as close to the way it was as possible."

Sweets nodded at Angela's perceptive reassurance, for everything he had seen in the house so far was indeed precisely placed. All surfaces were spotless and any freestanding items were aligned or otherwise particularly placed. If Sweets hadn't already believed in Booth's assessment about Kenneth Martin, it would not have taken long for him to begin approaching the same conclusions. This man required an environment free of mess and stray marks. He could easily be punishing anyone for interfering with this domain. However, Sweets also could not rule out the possibility that Karen was abusing Marcus in her own misguided attempts to protect them from his father.

Martin had led them to Marcus' room by now and stepping into his bedroom they found it was not unlike walking through the other parts of the house. His bed was neatly made, the desk was clear of all items with the exception of a lamp, trash and laundry baskets were both empty. Sweets asked if Martin had been in his son's room since he had been missing, pointing out the empty baskets.

"Yes, well, I decided it wouldn't help to let his room fill up with malodorous scents, would it? It's painful enough that he is . . . was missing." Before either Sweets or Angela could reply, Martin's phone rang and looking at the caller id, he indicated that he needed to take the call and stepped out.

"Sweets," Angela whispered with a grimace on her face, "this place is just creepy, don't you think? I can't even believe a thirteen-year old could have even lived in this room. It's not natural. Teenage boys should have posters all over their walls, sports equipment lying around on the floor, and school papers under the bed." She searched through his desk as Sweets looked through the closet. He discerned that at least one pair of shoes was missing and based upon the location of the empty hangers – in place where the organizational pattern would indicate – some clothing, as well. Two shirts, a sweatshirt – possibly hooded, two pairs of jeans.

"Sweets, look," Angela called him over. She had found an empty frame and guessed that it might have had the picture that they had found on Marcus that she was trying to restore. "When Martin comes back in here, I'm going to ask to use the bathroom. Distract him until I get back, okay?"

"What? Why?" But he did not have time to get an answer as Martin returned and then begrudgingly directed Angela to the bathroom. Searching quickly for something to keep Martin occupied, Sweets asked him about Marcus' health. "Was Marcus feeling alright before he disappeared? I mean, did it seem like he might be coming down with a cold or something?"

"I don't know. Don't kids get colds all the time? He seemed fine to me. Look, are you done here? I have a lot on my hands right now with planning a memorial service for Marcus since you all won't release his body to me and you can guess that this just isn't the best time for people other than family and friends to visit."

"Of course, Mr. Martin. We appreciate the time you've given us. I cannot imagine how difficult this must be to go through a second time. I'm very sorry for your loss."

For the first time, Sweets saw Martin's face weaken and display a moment of grief. It was almost a relief to find that there was some human emotion in this man and that he might have really loved his sons. The reaction was brief, however, and suspicion and anger soon replaced it as he asked what was taking Ms. Montenegro so long. Sweets was unable to detain him and Martin stormed out of Marcus' room to find Angela coming out of his own bedroom.

"I thought you were simply using the bathroom? What were you doing in _my_ bedroom?"


	8. Chapter 8

_**Chapter 8**_

Angela recovered well, although not entirely convincingly, by stating she had taken a wrong turn coming out of the bathroom and thought she was heading back to Marcus' room. Sweets felt sure that Martin could hear his heart pounding in his chest as he could see that Martin was no less irritated by this attempted explanation.

In a tightly controlled tone, he told them, "This is not about learning more about my son at all, is it? This is Agent Booth believing that I had something to do with my own child's death and sending a psychologist and a…" he gestured dismissively, "_whoever_ you are to spy on me. I suggest you leave right now and you can tell your Agent Booth that he would do well to do his own dirty detective work next time."

Sweets and Angela left without further delay and once outside Angela's eyes grew big with excitement as Sweets huffed out the air he felt like he had been holding in since Martin caught Angela exiting his bedroom.

"Well, that was exciting, wasn't it?"

Sweets looked at her incredulously as they got into his Corolla. "Exciting? More like crazy. And – haha," he said nervously, "- I know crazy. What were you thinking?"

"What? Booth wanted us to get a feel for the wife, too, didn't he? I was just trying to do my job. And I figured you could just pull out your gun if necessary, anyway."

"Gun? What gun? Uh, Angela, I don't carry a weapon."

"You don't? Isn't that a standard FBI thing?"

Sweets shook his head vehemently. "No. No, that is a standard FBI _agent_ thing. I am not an agent. I am a psychologist. You know, let's solve our problems with words, not fists. That sort of thing."

"Oh," Angela snorted, "well, that's good to know – but only now that we're not inside that psychopath's house anymore. That guy is seriously creepy."

"Totally."

They drove in silence for a few minutes, gathering their wits.

Suddenly Angela spoke up indignantly, "What was Booth thinking sending us in there without any backup? That was a serious lapse in judgment, don't you think, for such an experienced agent?"

Sweets jumped right in. "Totally. He definitely should have known better. I don't know why he thought we should go alone, right?"

Angela nodded in agreement. "Right. Exactly."

Feeling better about their assessment of the situation, Sweets cleared his throat and asked, "So, what did you find out?"

"What did I find out? Oh, right, well, I noticed that there were still two toothbrushes by the sink in their bathroom as well as a hairbrush and though it was lined up so perfectly that I almost didn't see it, a bottle of hand lotion on a table next to the bed."

"And what does that mean to you?"

"Well, if the toothbrushes weren't enough, I would still wonder about the lotion and the hairbrush. She's packing up to go away, right? She wouldn't leave those items behind."

"But Marcus definitely had items missing and I'm pretty confident everything would have been back in place if it had simply been in the laundry basket. And did you notice that none of the pictures around the house had Christopher, Marcus' younger brother? There is definitely some sort of disconnect going on there."

"And he's kind of mad at Booth. I'll be happy never to go back into that twilight zone again."

Sweets agreed. Agent Booth was going to have a hard time getting Martin to come in to cooperate with his investigation.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Booth and Parker walked into the Medico-Legal Lab of the Jeffersonian Institution simultaneously slurping down strawberry malts, remnants of their lunch at the same bar and grill that Booth had taken Bones and Kelly to just a couple of days earlier. Brennan looked up from the remains in front of her and felt the uncontrollable though not unexpected swoop in her stomach as she met Booth's smile with her own. He was walking with that easy, confident gait of his, his mood seemingly bolstered by the presence of his son, as it almost invariably was. She considered the past few days with him and dared to consider that another chance might reside in her future.

She noticed that they weren't coming up to the platform and, stripping off her gloves, she joined them at the base of the stairs.

"Hey Bones," Booth's grin, if possible, grew wider as she drew nearer. He held up his malt, "didn't think we should come on up with these." Brennan smiled and nodded her approval.

"Hi Bones," Parker joined in.

"Hello Parker. How is your arm feeling this morning? Are you in much pain?"

"Nah, only a little bit. Dad says if I just keep busy that'll help me forget about it, too. We've been playing games and stuff all morning and now we're gonna see Angela about drawing that logo on my cast while he talks to you guys about work - and maybe something else, too, right Dad?" He looked up at Booth with a knowing smile.

Booth smirked and ruffled Parker's hair while Brennan gave them a puzzled expression. Booth tossed his head in the direction of Angela's office, indicating they should walk and talk. "Let's talk business, first. I asked Sweets to meet us over here, too, to find out more about his and Angela's fishing expedition this morning."

"I do not know if they caught any . . . fish," she paused as she attempted to work with his metaphor, "but I do know that Angela said Martin's house gave her the heebee jeebies."

Parker giggled at Brennan's use of Angela's term, causing Brennan to let a chuckle slip which then allowed Booth to let out his own suppressed laughter, carrying them into Angela's office.

"Aww, aren't you all just the cutest little family coming in here right now," Angela gave a glowing smile. Booth noticed Brennan's expression change to a nervous one at this comment, but as for himself, he felt everything click into place inside of him as he gave Parker's shoulder an affectionate squeeze and nudged Brennan's shoulder gently and playfully with his own. This gesture eased some of her tension before she cleared her throat and promptly re-focused the conversation back to the case by asking if she'd had any success with the image enhancement to the photo found among Marcus' remains.

"Yes, I can show you what I have so far. It looks to be a shot of Marcus and—"

Booth cleared his throat loudly and made a chopping motion with his hand above Parker's head to indicate that they cut off that conversation immediately. It was bad enough to talk about the gruesome details of any of their cases around him, but this one involved someone Parker knew, even if only in passing.

Fortunately, Angela caught the hint and recovered. "You know what? I can just tell you about that in a second." She looked at Parker. "Baby Booth, I hear that I am helping you to become the kid with the coolest cast ever, right?"

Parker had rolled his eyes at being called "Baby Booth", but still agreed enthusiastically when she asked if he wanted to search for some images on her computer at her desk and then they would get to business.

Booth gave her a grateful look and he directed them to just outside of her office, which timed well with Sweets' arrival and he and Angela shared their findings with Booth. Angela went on to say that the re-imaging of the photo seemed to show a younger Marcus with a still younger child that they all guessed might be Christopher, the younger brother.

"Sweets, would it make sense for Marcus to have run away? We've been assuming that Marcus and his mom have or had been together when they disappeared. Maybe we're looking at two different events."

"Yeah," Sweets agreed, "I'd say that based upon Marcus' recent behaviors that it's possible he might consider running away. Do you think his mom went to look for him and something happened to her along the way?"

Booth scratched the back of his head and shrugged his shoulders. "Maybe. I don't know. We need a whole lot more to go on. We're coming up with nothing on Karen Martin, but I have yet to question anyone about her, although Metro PD has decided to re-boot their investigation into her disappearance, now, given the development with Marcus." He turned to Brennan. "Do we know anything about possible murder weapons, yet? Do Hodgins or Cam have anything else?"

Brennan held out an arm to indicate that they should go to the platform where the bones currently resided. "While I have been examining the rest of the victim's remains, Dr. Edison has been concentrating on the injury to the occipital bone." She swiped her badge through the security gate and she, Booth, and Sweets made their way up the steps.

"Dr. Edison, can you tell Booth what you've determined so far, regarding the cause of death?"

"Agent Booth, Dr. Brennan," Clark greeted them. "Of course." He picked up the skull and explained how the angle of the entry wound and the surrounding impact fractures helped them confirm the amount of force that was likely needed and the size and shape of the possible weapon. Initial hypotheses suggested a v-shaped item. "Dr. Brennan told me that you thought about a garden tool such as a trowel or hand spade and that is a definite option. We're waiting on Dr. Hodgins for a particulate analysis to help us narrow down the choices."

Right on cue, they heard the chirp of the security gate and Hodgins ran up. "Which I have for you right now – at least an initial analysis. Overall particulates found with the remains include a combination of nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium-rich soils, poa pratensis – also known as Kentucky Bluegrass, and various pollens - all of which could easily be found around his neighborhood or the development site. Samples taken from the injury site include more interesting things such as Kevlar and rust, however. But, I haven't been able to break that down more."

"Okay. I'm still really liking Martin for this, but am gonna need more specifics to get a warrant to search his home much less even pull him in for questioning. Bones, I thought I'd try to go see Marcus' friend Oscar this evening. Feel up to questioning him with me?"

She gave a little nod, "Sure."

"Thanks, guys," Booth acknowledged everyone then turned back to Brennan and thinking of his converation with Parker, asked, "Can I talk to you for a second?"

"Yes, of course."

"I meant, in your office, maybe?"

She gave a nod in reply and Booth followed her off the platform and over to her desk.

"What did you want to talk to me about?"

Now that he had her alone to ask her, restless nerves began to overtake him. He started to pace, then forced himself to stop and reached into his pocket to alternate fiddling with the poker chip and the dice he always carried. He allowed these safety items to siphon away his nervousness and took a deep breath and sought out her eyes that captured the hues of the sea today.

For her own part, Brennan felt the tide of emotions that coursed through her partner in the way that she could only do with him, from knowing him so long and so well. His chestnut eyes were soft as he spoke.

"I was wondering if you wanted to go out with me, on a – you know on a date." He puffed out a stream of air, feeling simple relief at getting the words out.

Brennan was unprepared for the onslaught of feelings that buffeted her, though she couldn't fathom why. Hadn't she been dealing with these emotions head on for so long, now? Hadn't she just considered this possibility not even an hour ago? She didn't understand why she suddenly felt panic. Perhaps it was because they were in the middle of a case and this reminded her of how the FBI could sever their partnership. Perhaps it was because she had never fully believed they would get to this point. Before she considered any other possibilities, Booth closed the distance and lightly took her hands into his own.

"Bones. A date. Nothing more. We can just see how it goes, you know?" He held his breath in an effort to restrain himself from babbling in such a way that would rush her, desperate not to let himself make the same mistakes over and over again. He willed himself to hold it together no matter what she said. And when she agreed, he could barely contain himself. He wanted to scoop her into his arms, kiss her silly, dance, or do all three. Instead he satisfied himself with brushing the side of her face with the back of his fingers and smiled.

When Booth had taken her hands, Brennan's qualms and misgivings fell away immediately. She had determined long ago that she would not have regrets and her hands in his and his reassuring, safe, loving gaze quickly restored her calm certainty. Saying yes suddenly came easily and naturally and the smile that filled his entire face was both infectious and highly rewarding.

"When did you have in mind?" she asked him with a demure smile.

Was there any other smile that made his heart race more? "Saturday. Would you like to know what I have planned for us or be surprised?"

She cocked her head to the side and thought a moment. "I trust you."

Booth merely returned with a full on smile brimming with his trademark charm and self-assuredness as he gave her hand a squeeze before backing away to leave so that he could go grab Parker and bring him back home before Rebecca came by to pick him up.

He paused at her door, turned, and still wearing the grin, told her he'd pick her up later to question Marcus' friend. In much the same way it did when Booth walked into the lab earlier, Brennan felt that familiar flutter in her stomach as she watched him walk away.


	9. Chapter 9

_**Chapter 9**_

When Booth walked back into Angela's office, whistling cheerfully, he found the pair talking animatedly in front of what the squint squad sometimes called her "Angelatron". "Yeah, and then I landed right by the Carson's driveway."

"That's not bad airtime, kiddo, but you're right, definitely not enough time to complete that trick."

"What's all this?" Booth asked.

"Dad, look at this! Angela typed in all this stuff about me and Trey's jump and how high it was and everything and she was able to make a program that shows what I did and how I crashed. She says she can make it into a movie file that I can show everyone tomorrow!"

Booth nodded with an appreciative smile. It _was_ pretty cool and he really admired how great she always was with Parker. He showed off the Flyers logo she had drawn, also, in the center of his cast and Booth reminded him of his manners as he himself thanked Angela for helping them both out before shuffling them to the truck and on their way back home.

"Did you do it? Did you ask her?" Parker asked as they walked to the SUV.

Booth's big grin returned. "Yeah, buddy. This Saturday night's the big night. What do you think?"

"Cool," Parker nodded in approval.

"Yeah," Booth agreed. "Definitely cool."

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

"Booth."

"Seeley, it's Kelly."

_Oh God,_ he thought to himself. _Please be a professional call and not personal._ "Kelly, what can I do for you today? Am I already behind on some paperwork?"

"No, no – you're causing problems of another kind. You Booth boys were always good at that, weren't you?"

He gave a light chuckle. "That was part of the attraction, wasn't it? Girls like the bad boys." _Except for one girl_, he thought to himself with a deep contentment flooding through him.

"Well, men who have just found out that their son has been murdered don't, as it turns out. Kenneth Martin just filed a harassment complaint against you. Something about sending unofficial agents to snoop around?"

"Ah. Sounds like a man with something to hide. I guess we're onto something. So is this a courtesy call, or are you telling me I gotta come in and address this thing?"

"A heads up, I guess. We've got a few other things going, so a complaint from a guy that's potentially under investigation from the FBI is not really going to take priority, you know what I'm saying?"

"Right. Thanks. So you guys got anything on Karen Martin? Our forensics team is coming up dry at the construction development site and financials are showing no activity. It's a pretty amazing disappearing act." Kelly was a cop, but not directly involved in the investigation so he did not share everything they had uncovered, which was leading them to believe that Karen Martin was either dead or – though a long shot – kidnapped. The anomalies in the case were ridiculously frustrating. It didn't make sense that Marcus' and Karen's disappearance should be unrelated, and yet all of the evidence – including the lack of it thereof – indicated two separate events. None of it made sense.

Kelly confirmed that to the best of her knowledge, they had also been meeting up with dead ends. Before she could extend the conversation into a personal foray, Booth indicated that he needed to get going in order to get Parker back home and to go interview someone who might be able to help them with the case.

He and Parker picked Brennan up from the lab and Parker asked if she was excited for hers and Booth's date on Saturday night. "We thought of something really fun for you to do. I hope you like it."

"If you helped plan it then I am confident it will be quite a pleasant evening."

Booth smiled proudly at both Brennan and Parker as he proclaimed, "You can't go wrong with Booth men teamwork, right buddy?"

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Booth pulled into Oscar Fenton's driveway, unsure of what to expect from either Oscar or his family. A part of him felt he should leave his gun in the truck so that he would not be tempted to shoot anyone if what he suspected about Oscar's home situation was true. Oscar, himself, answered the door. He was a little smaller than the average 13-year old, but held himself aggressively – shoulders back and chest out. When Booth introduced themselves, he could practically see the walls rise up around the kid.

"We'd like to ask you a few questions about your friend, Marcus Martin."

"He ain't no friend of mine."

"May we come inside?" Brennan asked.

Oscar shrugged in response, which they decided to take as an assent. As they stepped inside, a gruff voice called out, "What are you doing, kid? Tell whoever's there we don't want any and shut the damn door on 'em!"

"They're cops, Dad," Oscar yelled back.

"Actually, only Agent Booth is—"

"Not now, Bones," Booth hissed.

A short, stocky man ambled over, holding a beer can. "We don't want any of them, either," he chuckled at his own joke.

Oscar rolled his eyes and folded his arms in front of him as he leaned against the wall. Booth's expression remained impassive as he pulled out his badge and re-introduced themselves.

Turning to Oscar, who immediately looked down and seemed to shrink within himself, he snarled out, "What'd you do now, kid?" He turned back to Booth and Brennan. "He's always getting into fights. Didn't know it could lead to some federal thing, though. You come here to arrest him?"

Brennan's eyes furrowed together in confusion at Mr. Fenton's illogical conclusions, then studied Oscar, who seemed to be favoring his left arm. "No, we are not here to arrest your son." Booth said. "We'd just like to ask him a few questions about a classmate of his. With your permission, I'd like to take him down to our offices for that."

Oscar straightened up, suddenly. "No. I mean . . . can't we just do it here? I'm supposed to be taking care of my little brother . . ." He looked up to the top of the stairs where they had not noticed a smaller figure sitting quietly.

Booth quickly made his decision. "Hey buddy," he said with a smile, his tone much more amiable. "Want to tag along with us and get a peek inside the FBI?" At the boy's excited grin, Booth turned back to Mr. Fenton. "Also, with your permission, of course."

"Get them both out of my hair? Be my guest." And with that he walked away without a second glance.

Oscar's walled up scowl had returned, but his brother, who eagerly introduced himself as Liam, darted out to the truck with zeal. It was a night and day change from his silence in the house to nonstop chatter on the way to the Hoover building. Oscar tried to quiet him, but Booth assured him it was fine and pointed out that Brennan worked with bones from real live people.

"No, that's not actually correct. The people are dead," she clarified matter-of-factly. Booth did not bother to explain his expression, but merely nodded and smiled as the intended result was successful; Liam bombarded her with questions, carrying them easily through the rest of the drive to the Bureau.

Approaching his office, Booth employed the help of one of his colleagues to help with Liam. "Okay, pal. This here is Sam. He's going to give you the grand tour and you're going to discover all of the secrets of the FBI. What do you think about that, huh?"

"Awesome." They exchanged high fives before he ushered both Brennan and Oscar into his office. Oscar sat in one of the chairs in front of Booth's desk while Booth opted to sit at the other one, instead of behind his desk.

"I didn't kill Marcus," Oscar blurted out right away.

"Who said anybody did?" Booth asked.

"Cops don't go around asking people stuff if someone only died, do they?"

Booth shrugged and Brennan answered, "Sometimes we don't know for sure if someone was murd—killed by accident or not, so we ask questions to find out. But yes, in this case, someone killed Marcus."

Oscar crossed his arms in front of him again. "I didn't do it."

"So, maybe you have an idea who did?" Booth asked.

"I don't know anything about it. I told you. Marcus wasn't my friend."

"Look, Oscar, I get it. I understand the system you guys had going. You were friends enough."

"Whatever. What do you know about how it is, anyway?"

Booth leaned forward and rested his forearms along his knees. "I know something." His expression was serious as he steadily returned Oscar's gaze.

Oscar regarded him a moment before answering, "Yeah, alright. Marcus' dad liked to knock him around. Sometimes it's easier just to knock each other around instead, you know?"

Brennan almost held her breath as her eyes never left Booth's face. He neither agreed nor disagreed with Oscar, but she had studied his eyes often enough to know when they belied verbalizations and what she saw was an implicit understanding. Perhaps it wasn't born of the exact same experience as had been described, but as she had seen before in these kinds of cases with him, it was a compelling empathy that not just any agent could possess.

"When did you last see Marcus?"

"The night before he disappeared. Said he was gonna run away. He'd talked about it before, though, so I didn't really take him seriously. But then he didn't show up at school the next day or the day after . . ."

"Did he talk about where he might go? Or mention his mother?" Brennan asked.

Oscar shook his head. "He'd always just talk about it in passing – you know, 'one day I'm just gonna run away', but I don't think he ever had a plan or anything. And his mom – he always used to talk about how his mom was too scared to do or say anything anymore. Everything got so messed up after his brother died."

"Did Marcus ever talk about anyone else? Other friends? Family? Any problems with anybody?" Booth asked.

"Nah. It was just me and him most of the time. Wait," Oscar paused as a memory came to him. "There was this one guy that he talked about recently. Some kid he hung out with at the QuickStop. Mike or Matt or something like that. I think he was older. He didn't go to our school."

Booth nodded in appreciation. "Thanks. Hey, I'm going to grab a soda; want one, too?"

Oscar gave half a shrug. "Yeah, sure."

Booth stood and gave Oscar a pat on the shoulder. "Hang tight, we'll be right back."

He put a light hand on Brennan's arm to lead her out to grab snacks. "Shouldn't we be getting them home if we have all the information we need? It's getting late."

"Yeah, I'm just buying him a little time, first. So what do you think, Bones? You think Marcus ran away?"

"Based upon what Sweets and Angela saw in his room and what Oscar said, I would say that is a plausible route to consider."

"Yeah, me too – but I'm still frustrated with not knowing anything about Karen Martin. We're missing something, Bones. I can't see it, yet."

Brennan placed a hand on his arm. "Booth, it's still early. We haven't even analyzed all the evidence and you haven't questioned everyone, yet. We'll get there."

Booth exhaled. "Yeah. Yeah, you're right. I know you're right, it's just usually I have a better feel by now and the thing with Parker kind of, I don't know, threw me for a loop or something."

"Booth," Brennan asked hesitantly.

"What?"

"Oscar was favoring his arm. I think he was trying to hide it, but do you think—"

"Yeah, Bones. I do. That's why I'm trying to buy him some time. C'mon, let's bring back the snacks; Sam will probably be back with Liam by now, too."

Returning to his office did indeed find them with Liam's return, who had obviously been talking Oscar's ear off with all that he had seen. Booth handed them each a candy bar and a soda to share.

"So, once you guys finish up, I'll take you back home. Things gonna be okay when I do that?"

Oscar met Booth's gaze and seemed to contemplate the meaning behind the question. "Yeah, he'll be passed out by now."

"You know I'm going to call someone, right?" Booth asked him in a quiet voice. Oscar looked down and nodded as Booth continued. "Do you trust me enough to know that it'll be someone who can really help?" Oscar nodded again.

Dropping off Oscar and Liam, Booth waited for the all clear signal from Oscar before backing out and driving Brennan home. Booth did not wait for Brennan's questions.

"Oscar's dad drinks. The more he drinks, the worse he is, but he eventually stops because he passes out. Oscar knows when this is. I'll call in a favor first thing tomorrow morning to make sure he and Liam get taken care of right away."

"I don't like that we brought them back into this situation tonight."

Booth sighed heavily and did not respond right away. "I know. I don't either, but there wasn't much we could do tonight. They'll be alright tonight and we'll get them out tomorrow. They'll be okay."

"There you go again with your certainty with no tangible evidence," Brennan sighed in exasperation.

"You and me, Bones. _That's_ my evidence." He gave a gentle nod as she looked over to him in surprise. "Right? We made it through and look where we are now. I'm with the world-reknowned forensic anthropologist with the biggest heart I know." She gave him a crooked smile, but he recognized her next expression and as she opened her mouth to object he grabbed her hand. "C'mon, Bones. It counts for something, you know it does."

"It does. But I would say that what counts more is that they have you on their side. That, to me, is the more reliable and current proof that they will be okay."

"Both of us, Bones. They have both of us on their side. They're going to be just fine."


	10. Chapter 10

_**Chapter 10**_

Booth started his Friday morning having coffee with the social worker, Cassidy, who agreed to move forward that day with getting Oscar and Liam out of their current home situation. She and Booth had worked together before on other cases, and as much as she trusted his instincts and sense of urgency of a situation, he trusted her to follow through with acting upon it. He texted Bones afterward to assure her that the boys were in capable hands with Cassidy.

Next on his list was to visit another social worker, the one in charge of Marcus Martin's case. He wasn't sure, exactly, what she'd be able to contribute, except for maybe helping with confirming suspicions regarding the source of Marcus' abuse. He also wanted to stop by the bakery where Karen worked to see if there was something the Metro detectives weren't able to pry out of them.

The interview with the social worker proved productive in at least confirming that it was indeed Kenneth Martin who was probably abusing Marcus and likely even Karen. Karen had been extremely tense and nervous when Sheila, the caseworker, had been interviewing them. Everything had been vehemently denied and with little other physical evidence, there had been no cause to remove Marcus from the home. Booth mentioned the observations made by Sweets and Angela regarding the structured environment.

"Their home was very clean and neat, but mostly I was struck by how little either Mrs. Martin or Marcus spoke or even moved while they all sat together. Even when I had Marcus on his own, he moved very little and certainly wasn't forthcoming about anything. He told me he'd simply gotten in a fight with a classmate and that there wasn't anything more to it." She crossed her arms in front of her and chewed her lip. "Is it horrible of me to wish I had seen greater evidence of injury from Marcus? I mean, then I would have removed him from that home and he might be alive, today."

"We can't spend all of our time second guessing ourselves though, can we?" Booth told her. "You did what you could do with the information you had. You couldn't know that this would happen."

Sheila merely nodded as Booth thanked her and left his card in case she thought of any other information that might help – especially with anything that might help them find Karen.

Thinking of Karen Martin, he headed over to the bakery where she worked. It was a small shop that seemed to specialize in variety. Booth's mouth watered at the countless doughnuts, pastries, cakes, and cookies before him. How had he not known about this place, before? He and Parker were definitely going to have to come back.

An older woman with greying hair greeted him. When he showed her his badge and introduced himself, she brought a hand to her mouth and asked if he had found "our Karen".

"No, I'm sorry, we haven't. Can you tell me when you last saw her?"

"A couple of weeks ago on Tuesday. She was working her normal shift. She usually works Tuesday-Saturday, but then she didn't show up on Wednesday and didn't call or anything, which isn't like her. She is always so prompt and hardly ever misses a day of work, especially since that sweet little boy of hers passed away." They had taken turns calling her home number and her cell phone number and finally made contact with Kenneth, who mentioned that Marcus never showed up for school, either. "It's all so horrible," the woman grew teary-eyed. "Such tragedy for that family. Poor, poor Mr. Martin."

Another bakery employee who had been helping a customer appeared and snorted. "Poor Mr. Martin? By the sounds of it, Karen should be happy she got away."

Booth raised his eyebrows at her. "And you are…?"

"Sandy. That man was a real piece of work. Karen never missed a day and was always on time because this place was a safe escape. I hope you never find her, because that means she and that one guy—" she turned to Rose, the older woman, "Ron, right? It means Ron found a safe place away from that freak."

"Ron? Can you tell me more about this guy?"

Rose pursed her lips together and glared at Sandy, who ignored her and let the story spill out to the agent. "Rose doesn't want to say anything because we promised Karen that we wouldn't. But with Marcus dead, I don't think that's the way to go anymore. Karen would want to know about that, right? I mean, I thought Marcus was supposed to be _with_ them. What if this guy, Ron, isn't who she thought he was?"

"So you didn't tell the police any of this back when they questioned you when Karen and Marcus were reported missing?" They shook their heads. "Alright. I need you to tell me everything you know right now."

Several weeks ago, Ron had started coming into the bakery at around eight in the morning for a doughnut and coffee. Karen usually waited on him and he started coming in on a daily basis except for Saturdays. Karen started taking her break at the same time and they would talk for her whole break.

"She started to seem really happy and hopeful, you know?" Sandy told him. "I mean, it's kind of not right, I suppose, with Karen being married and all, but she deserved a little happiness."

"What can you tell me about him? A last name? Does he live or work around here? When was the last time you saw him?"

"I don't know a last name and I'm not sure if he lives nearby, but I think he might work nearby. I think Karen mentioned he was an architect?"

Booth stopped writing suddenly as he made an unwelcome connection that he desperately hoped was a coincidence. Without saying a word, he motioned to Sandy and Rose to wait for a moment as he took out his phone and sent in a DMV request. As he waited for the response, he asked Sandy to continue with her story.

Karen had started opening up more about how things were getting worse at home for both she and Marcus with Kenneth. They felt like they could barely breathe correctly for Kenneth to take it the wrong way.

"She was scared," Sandy continued, "but she felt like Ron could help them. He said he would look into finding someplace they could all go together and be safe. It was like a lifeline for Karen. Sandy and Rose had always offered to have Karen and Marcus stay with either of them, but Karen insisted they needed to be out of town, out of touch, entirely. When she didn't show up for work on that Wednesday and neither did Ron, we assumed that they left together."

"Wait, so you haven't seen Ron, either, since Karen's disappearance?" They shook their heads and Booth's phone chirped a return message from his ID request. He showed them the photo on his phone. "Is this the guy?"

"Yeah, that's him. How did you know?"

Booth didn't answer that question, but thanked them and left his card and the shop feeling tense.

Ron Gorman, Kelly Gorman's husband, had just become a suspect.


	11. Chapter 11

_**Author's Note: I have been remiss in not giving a shout out to angiebc (andreuuchis on Twitter) for this and the past couple of chapters. She has been great about giving them a read-through and offering encouraging feedback.**_

_**And, because it will make her laugh, I will also announce that I have indeed used "effect" as a verb in this chapter and have done so correctly. :D**_

_**Chapter 11**_

Booth sat in his SUV trying to re-group. _Damn it._ What were the odds that he'd run into an old classmate and that her _husband_ would be involved in one of his cases? No, really. _What were the frickin' odds?_ He may not have the exact math down in his head, but he had played the odds enough in the past to recognize the glaring problem with this whole scenario. There were no coincidences in murder.

He pulled out his phone and called Bones to let her know he was going to stop by and maybe she'd like to join him on some interviews that afternoon?

"Sure. Booth? Is something wrong?"

"No, no…it's just a new wrinkle in the case. I'll tell you about it when I get there."

Talking to his partner already effected a more focused perspective on the new information he had gathered and allowed him to better process the possibilities as he drove to the Jeffersonian. Based upon what Sandy and Rose knew, Ron was not exactly having an affair with Karen, but something was definitely going on. Booth thought about how Kelly said that Ron was out of town and now wondered where "out of town" was. Had he helped Karen run away? Did they know about her son? Both his disappearance and his death had made the news so surely she did? Unless she wasn't alive? Who knew what kind of guy Ron was. Hell, he didn't even really know what Kelly was like now, either, although it hadn't seemed like she had changed all that much.

What did she know? That was the bigger part that made him uneasy. And here he thought he had to be worried about reliving "old times". He would have rather found ways to dodge those conversations than prepare for the ones to come that could not be avoided.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Booth jogged up the steps to the platform and saw Bones and Clark studying what looked to be, if he knew some of the major bones by now, an ulna or a radius. "Ulna!" he called out.

Brennan looked up and corrected him. "Actually, the radius. But for an untrained observer, such as yourself, I can see how you might get them confused."

Booth smiled in response, deciding not to be disappointed that she found his near correct guess to be impressive. "So what about this radius has you two so interested? Are we rethinking anything regarding cause of death?"

"While we have not changed our conclusions with cause of death, we are still examining all of the bones in order to get a complete picture. Clark noticed a fracture on the victim's right radius." She indicated that Clark should continue.

"At first we thought it might be a defensive wound, because it was almost unnoticeable, but upon further examination, it looks to have already undergone remodeling."

"No x-rays to corroborate it?" Booth asked. Clark shook his head. "What's that mean?"

"It means that he might have fractured his arm at some point, but simply never got it treated," Brennan explained.

"Can you figure out what might have caused it?"

"It appears to reflect a blow to the arm from this position," Brennan held up her own arm like half of an "x" and gestured with her other, "or—"

Booth grabbed her arm and mimicked it being slammed against the edge of the table. "Or like this."

"That is correct." Brennan chose not to ask how Booth guessed this second method, nor did he volunteer the information. "How long ago would this have happened?"

"It could be as much as six months ago. We have also found markers on his sixth and seventh rib that indicate past trauma."

As much as he wanted to punch Kenneth Martin in the face repeatedly for what he inflicted upon his son, it was not information he could use to directly tie him to Marcus' murder. He needed something more concrete. Brennan recognized his frustration and addressed it. "But, that doesn't necessarily help us figure out who killed him. Angela has been working on cleaning up and deciphering what was written on one of the scraps of paper that we found with the remains and I think Hodgins has narrowed down the chemicals among the particulate matter."

"Are we still thinking that it's possible a garden spade or shovel or something could have caused the fatal blow?"

"Yes, but without actual weapons to compare directly, we can't give a precise answer to that."

"Depending upon what Hodgins found, it might be enough for a warrant to search Martin's place for it."

Brennan stripped off her gloves. "Let's go see Hodgins."

As they walked, Brennan asked about the new wrinkle that Booth had mentioned on the phone. He stopped to explain what he had learned from the women at the bakery. "Do you think Karen is with Ron? Or that Ron would hurt her?" Brennan asked.

Booth put his hands on his hips and shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know what to think. I don't even know what to think about Kelly."

This time it was Brennan's turn to take Booth's hand. "We don't have all the evidence, yet, Booth. You don't have to think anything about her, yet, if you don't want to."

Booth gave her a half smile for this logical perspective and brushed his thumb along her fingers before reluctantly releasing her hand so that they could continue to Hodgins' Ookie Room.

"Booth, Dr. B!" Hodgins greeted them with his standard enthusiasm. Booth considered how Bones had told him that once upon a time Hodgins had anger issues, which Booth never really understood, but that attitude had clearly fallen to the wayside quite a while ago. Booth liked to believe that it was because of Angela, much in the same way he knew that Bones had a calming effect on him. Except, of course, when she drove him crazy.

"Hodgins, do you have anything useful for me?"

"The proportion of nitrogen and phosphorous we found around the occipital bone fracture as well as around other parts of the remains matches common fertilizers. The iron oxide concentration is common on steel tools – and could definitely form under the breakdown of the Kevlar coating, which is common on household garden tools."

"So, we're looking for gardening or yard work tools as well as lawn fertilizer."

"Right. Oh, and tell your guys to look especially for the more loamy mixes of soil and fertilizer," he added as Booth was already calling Caroline to put in the request for a warrant, then his office to arrange for a forensics team to be ready if the warrant went through.

He waved to Hodgins as he turned to leave. "Thanks Hodgins. Bones, let's stop and see Angela before visiting Ron Gorman's office while we wait for the judge to sign off on the warrant. Then we can surprise our good friend Kenneth. What do you say?"

"I would say that I hope you are being sarcastic about Kenneth being our good friend, in which case I would like very much to surprise him with his own garden shovel," Brennan said with unexpected venom.

"Bo-ones," Booth chortled out with appreciation. "I think I'd rather enjoy it a little too much to see you do that."

"If you are talking about whacking that creep, Martin, up the side of the head with a heavy object, I will buy front row tickets for that one," Angela cut in as the partners entered her office.

Booth gave an incredulous whistle. "Keep reminding me of these moments so that I always stay on you two's good side."

"Are you implying that I have a bad side?"

Damn those hormones. Angela had already been a more highly charged woman, but the pregnancy hormones were really throwing her for a loop. For the briefest of moments, Booth gave a sigh of relief to think that Bones was so rational and levelheaded that if she ever chose to have a baby, after all, things might be much smoother sailing with her. At present, however, Booth merely threw on his most charming smile. "Angela, look at you. You know perfectly well that right now especially, _every_ side of you is beautiful." She snorted at him, but accepted his kiss on her cheek without argument.

"Oh, and I almost forgot," Booth pulled a smallish box out of his jacket pocket. "As a thank you for taking care of Parker yesterday. I really appreciate it and he was super excited about both the logo on his cast and the video. Maple butter crumpets from the bakery I was at this morning. The place has _everything_."

"Okay, now I forgive you your cheesy compliment. These smell too good. And by the way, you know quite well that you like being surrounded by women who can kick your ass."

Booth only grinned.

"Ange, where you able to decipher what was written on that scrap of paper found with the remains?" Brennan interrupted impatiently.

Angela slipped Booth a conspiratorial look before sharing her findings. It was a phone number. She had been able to decipher all but the last number, which made it much easier to narrow the possibilities. Five of the numbers belonged to various businesses. Two of them were currently disconnected and had been for quite some time. The remaining four seemed most promising as they belonged to either residences or cell phones. Angela handed Booth the printout, which he folded and pocketed with plans to dig into that task either later that afternoon, or perhaps over the weekend, that is, if he felt he would be able to concentrate at all tomorrow, knowing what was to come at the end of the day.

And with that thought, Booth spun around behind Bones and, placing his hands on the sides of her shoulders, he guided her out of Angela's office as though to hurry along to that moment. "C'mon, Bones. Lots to do, yet this afternoon. Let's grab your stuff and be on our way."

Booth "manhandling" her brought Brennan an unexpected pleasure that she tried very hard to hide. She knew it would drive her crazy again one of these days, but for now, it felt reassuring. It had been far too long since they had been at this comfort level and she only now recognized what this meant; she was very much looking forward to tomorrow night's date.


	12. Chapter 12

_**Chapter 12**_

They stopped by Ron Gorman's architectural firm, first. Booth had called ahead of time if for no other reason than to confirm that Gorman was not in his office. Booth suspected that Gorman had not been in his office in over two weeks.

This was confirmed by the firm's secretary. "He went up to Aberdeen, Maryland for a couple of days for a consult, but he needed to be back here for work on the Kirkland project."

Booth and Brennan exchanged glances. "The Kirkland project? You mean the one where we found Marcus Martin's body?" Booth asked.

Janie, the secretary, looked extremely uncomfortable at this connection. "Yes, the firm is trying really hard to tamp down the publicity on that one. They're worried investors might back out."

"I'm pretty sure that finding out what happened to Marcus and his mother takes a higher priority right now," Brennan chastised her.

"Yes, yes of course. The thing is, Mr. Gorman hasn't been back in the office since his trip two weeks ago Tuesday. He's been working remotely from home. Or, at least that's what he said he was doing," she added hastily after seeing Booth's raised eyebrows.

"Has he made any visits to the development site in the past three weeks?"

Janie told them that he had appointments to do so, but couldn't verify whether or not he had actually showed up. There hadn't been any complaints from the foreman of the construction crew or from the project manager, so she assumed he had been.

Booth thanked her, took down information about the project manager, and left his card with her, encouraging her to let him know of anything that she might have forgotten.

Booth and Brennan made their way out of the office and Brennan asked, "Do we go see Ron Gorman at his home, then?"

"Do you think he's really there?" Booth quizzed her.

"Given that on Tuesday Kelly told us that her husband was out of town, I would have to conclude that either she is lying or Ron is lying to her. What reason would Kelly have for lying about where her husband was?"

"That's what I'd like to know. We either go talk to her right now, or try to find Ron, first. I don't think he's hiding out at his house."

"But you think he's hiding."

"Yes." They paused when they approached the SUV. Booth waited to hear Brennan's thoughts. He was rather enjoying how her investigative skills outside of the lab were really coming along. Sure, she had always been a pro at following the logic of a case, but now she was really letting herself explore the other aspects such as motivation behind decisions.

"So, what will it mean to talk to Kelly? If she doesn't know that Ron isn't really out of town, how will that affect her?" Brennan asked.

"Ron's avoided his own office for over two weeks and may or may not have made an appearance at the development site where Marcus' remains were found? There's no way he's at home and no way that she doesn't know something about it and I find that this information is suddenly starting to annoy me a great deal." Booth felt an unexpected rush of frustration flow out of him. "She's a _cop_ and if she isn't covering something up, she's at the minimum holding back crucial information so what it will _mean_ to talk to Kelly doesn't really matter to me anymore."

Brennan looked at him in concern. He sighed. "I don't like it when cops feel like they can cover things up or sweep things under the rug."

"And maybe you're mad that it's an old high school friend, too, that's doing it?"

Booth returned her questioning gaze. "Yeah. Something like that." He stood up straight and opened the door to the truck for her. "I'll call to verify Janie's story about whether or not Gorman showed up to meet with the foreman and then we'll go have a chat with Kelly about old times."

As Booth circled around to the driver's side of the truck, however, his phone rang. Answering it, he was informed that the warrant to search Kenneth Martin's garage, tool shed, and surrounding exterior property had been granted.

"Change of plans, Bones," he said as he hopped into the SUV. "We've got our warrant. Time for our surprise visit to Mr. Martin."

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

To say that Kenneth Martin was annoyed with the intrusion of the FBI forensics team and the presence of a certain investigative agent was an understatement. Seething might have reflected his attitude more accurately.

"Just one more thing to add to my harassment complaint against you, Agent Booth," Martin said through gritted teeth.

"Yeah, because beating on your family and later killing them really can't compare to the inconveniences I'm causing you, can it?" Booth replied evenly.

"I didn't kill my son. The gall of you all to continually imply that I could is ridiculous and reflects an appalling ignorance on your part."

"Booth?" Brennan called out.

"Yeah?"

"We've gathered and tagged all possible implements that could serve as a murder weapon as well as soil samples and fertilizer containers."

"Any blood traces anywhere?"

"Not that we could find, but if the blow was swift and the shovel was coated with soil or other matter, it's possible that blood would not have made contact with the metal."

Booth turned to Martin. "For someone who is so adamant for having not been involved with his own son's death and being so convinced that his wife _is_ involved, I would think it would be an easy decision right now to come on back to the Bureau for some questions."

"And let you manipulate the conversation into further implicating me in something I had nothing to do with? I don't think so. If you had enough to arrest me you would have done so by now."

Booth shook his head and gave a low whistle. "Doesn't mean I won't still come back when I have my evidence. And trust me, we'll find it."

"Is that a threat?"

"I have no need of threats when I have the facts and evidence. Enjoy your freedom while it lasts, Martin. I'll be back with my arrest warrant." Booth turned and headed back to the truck with his partner.

"I don't understand why you didn't arrest him," Brennan said.

"I probably could have, but this guy isn't giving us anything unless I have some compelling show and tell evidence to corner him. Right now, all I have is a weak alibi, inconclusive motive, and no physical evidence."

"I think we should be able to arrest him for child abuse. We have enough evidence for that, don't we?"

Booth gave her a sympathetic glance as he started the car. "Even if we could do a posthumous arrest like that, we don't even have much for that. There is no direct evidence that ties Kenneth to the abuse."

"We have Oscar Fenton. He could testify against him."

"I'm not gonna ask Oscar to do any such thing when we know what Martin is capable of. Besides, Bones, I don't understand why you are pushing on this. We can't arrest him for that anyway."

"So we just let him walk around free right now? Knowing what we know about him?" Brennan's voice started to rise in anger.

Booth sighed in exasperation. "Look, I don't like it either, but I don't understand what you expect me to do. Tell me what it is you think should or can happen right now."

"I want you to lock him up for what he did to his family."

"I'm _trying_ to do that. I thought you were helping me?"

"Why didn't the social worker do anything?"

"Sheila did what she could."

"She could have done more," Brennan contradicted. "She could have gotten Marcus out of that home and maybe he'd still be alive."

"Bones, that's not fair and you know it."

"Neither is what happened to Marcus."

Booth clenched his jaw as he tried to understand what had knocked Brennan into this loop. "You're the one that usually tells me not to assume anything without all of the evidence. What was Sheila to do without all of the evidence? She couldn't even get Marcus to admit to anything."

Using mocking air quotes she retorted, "You follow your 'gut' all of the time. Why didn't she do the same? Why couldn't she get him to talk?"

"Oh, so now my gut is suddenly something to be trusted?" Brennan did not answer. "She's not a trained criminal investigator." He looked over at her tight, angry expression. "What is going on? What has you so angry with this guy right now?"

"The system. It's the whole ridiculous 'system'. It failed _both_ of us, Booth. You say that we are evidence that Oscar and Liam will be okay, but if we are evidence, then clearly the _system_ is not a part of that success. If the _system_ had worked for us, I wouldn't have had foster parents who thought it was okay to lock kids up in the trunk of a car and you wouldn't have had to wait for your grandfather to kick your father out of the house."

"What?"

Brennan wanted to kick herself as she realized what just happened. Though she could not very often do it with others, she had developed a knack for being able to read Booth's face and discern some of his emotions. But not this time. She felt paralyzed by this realization, especially given the complete thoughtlessness of her utterance. She had made a promise to Hank that she would tell him when the time was right, and that she would hold him if he needed it. How could she have let her emotions take control like that? Just as quickly as her anger and frustration had built, they fizzled away.

"Booth . . ." She couldn't seem to find any other words.

Booth's hands gripped the steering wheel tighter, unnerved by what Brennan just told him. It wasn't _what_ she said about his dad, but the fact that she knew it that threw him for a loop. How did she know that? Then there was the fact that she was still worried about Oscar and Liam; to hear her bring up one of her worst foster care situations practically within the same breath of their predicament explained her sudden outburst about the Martins, who were really only tangential to Oscar's and Liam's story at this point.

He realized that she was looking at him, waiting for him to say something. They had reached the circular drive of the Jeffersonian and Booth pulled up to the curb. "Look, I'll call Cassidy and check on the status of Oscar and Liam, okay? Maybe we can stop by tonight or tomorrow and visit so we can check on them?"

Brennan nodded, wondering at his reaction. She hadn't said anything about needing to see them, and yet somehow, with his saying that they could, she realized that she would definitely feel better if she could see that they were in a safe and caring home. On the other hand, she became apprehensive about the fact that he was not saying anything about what she had let slip about his father. That was surely a bad sign. Before she could attempt to bring it up, however, he began talking again.

"I'm going to go talk to Kelly. Let me know if you get a match for the murder weapon and then we'll see about when it will work out to visit the Fenton kids."

"Maybe I should come with you to interview Kelly?"

"Nah," he shook his head nonchalantly. "You should be here at the lab helping us get our evidence, so I can nail this guy, right?"

He gave her a reassuring smile in that way he always did when he didn't want her to worry about him. This time it almost seemed to increase her anxiety, but she recognized, as she was sure that he did too, that she had to set that anxiety aside in order for them both to work the case effectively. She would have to worry about the repercussions of their conversation at a later time.


	13. Chapter 13

_**Chapter 13**_

Booth expelled yet another sigh as he watched Brennan enter the Jeffersonian. He took a moment to re-group yet again before putting the car back in drive to go talk to Kelly. He tried to wrap his brain around Bones' outburst and what to make of it. He figured maybe it was the whole idea that the Fenton boys were likely going to be in foster care that triggered it. And then there was the whole thing about Pops kicking his dad out. How long had she been holding onto that bit? And why? He decided at this point that it really didn't matter. He had to focus on getting information out of Kelly and finding Karen Martin. His issues were entirely irrelevant and he certainly had no desire to reflect upon them.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Brennan walked with brusque determination into her office to slip on her lab coat and as she clipped her ID badge to her lapel, Cam stepped just inside the door.

"Cam. Did the FBI forensics team arrive with the Martin evidence already?"

"No, but they should be here within a few minutes. Are you all right?"

"Yes, I'm fine. Why would you ask that?"

Cam gave a sweeping gesture with her arm from the Jeffersonian entrance to Brennan's office. "Your entrance was fast and furious with your beeline straight into here. You didn't even notice me try to catch your attention."

"I am not furious, why would I be furious? And if you mean to say that I followed a straight line here, I would not compare such a thing to a bee's flight—"

Cam held her hand up. "Nevermind. I just wanted to know if you were okay and, obviously you are. So," she moved on quickly, "we were able to find some blood traces from some of the victim's clothing."

"Enough to get a DNA sample?"

"Yes. I'm running the analysis on it right now, but was able to get a blood type and it isn't Marcus Martin's blood."

"Do we know Kenneth Martin's blood type?"

Cam pursed her lips and shook her head. "And from what I'm hearing from you and Booth, it sounds like Martin won't give up any information even as basic as that without a fight."

Brennan shifted uncomfortably recalling how she had accused Booth and Sheila of not doing enough, which led her to the end of their conversation. "We will find the evidence we need to find whoever is responsible," she said resolutely and pushed past Cam as she headed to the lab platform where the FBI forensics team was now arriving with the tagged implements and fertilizers from Martin's home.

Clark was already signing in the evidence as Brennan joined him and Cam went to get Hodgins. "Dude's definitely meticulous," Clark commented upon seeing the spotless garden tools.

"Yes, Angela and Sweets certainly felt his home reflected an abnormal level of cleanliness and order. His lawn is well manicured as well."

Brennan and Clark immediately set to work examining the surface of the tools and taking measurements while Hodgins claimed the fertilizers. After a full analysis of the surface areas and comparing measurements to the wound, they came up empty. Hodgins' results were equally inconclusive.

"Booth is not going to be happy," Cam commented after hearing Brennan's and Hodgins' updates.

Brennan stripped off her gloves and began unbuttoning her lab coat as she strode off the platform. "I'll go tell him that we are looking for someone else."

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Booth sat in his truck in front of Kelly's house. For a moment he considered holding off on questioning her, but quickly discarded that thought, knowing Karen's life could possibly still be relying on wherever this trail led him. He got out, walked up the front walk, rang the bell, and prayed that it wouldn't be one of her daughters that answered the door.

No such luck. A girl who looked to be about sixteen or seventeen opened the door. Booth pulled away his sunglasses and gave a brief smile and decided to pull out his badge. "Special Agent Seeley Booth. Is your mom around?"

The girl rolled her eyes, backed up a step and shouted, "Mom! One of your cop friends is here!" She walked away, leaving Booth to wonder whether or not he could or should enter the house. Before he landed on a final decision, Kelly showed up with a surprised grin.

"Hey Seeley!" Booth managed a return smile as she held the door open for him and threw him off guard with a friendly peck on the cheek and a lingering hand on his arm. Clearly Ron was not at home, which kept him focused on his reason for being there. He smoothly stepped past her to disconnect their physical contact.

"Look, Kelly. I'm sorry, but I'm not here on a social visit."

He watched a flash of – something – pass through her eyes before she became more serious. "Is this about the harassment charges? Because I told you not to worry about –"

"No, I don't care about that. I think you know why I'm here," he told her quietly.

This time her eyes held his as they reflected a sad realization. "Is there somewhere we can talk?" he asked.

She nodded and indicated for him to follow her into an adjoining living room. Kelly closed the French doors behind her before sitting on the couch while Booth chose a chair opposite.

"Where's Ron, Kelly?"

Her shoulders sagged. "I don't know."

Booth's expression tightened as he leaned forward, "I know he's your husband, but no one knows where Karen Martin is – or whether she's dead or alive – so damn it, do the right thing here and tell me where I can find him."

"_I don't know,_" she said forcefully and stood up to pace angrily. "Shit, Seeley, if he hadn't been such an asshole lately, I might well have been doing what I could to protect him, but he hasn't deserved that in a while."

Booth leaned back again, seemingly to give her more space and an opening to tell him more. "But you _have_ been protecting him – ever since you set foot on the construction site for his firm's development."

"I know, it's stupid, isn't it? Why should I keep covering up for that lying bastard? But it's the girls. I don't want them hurt."

He looked at her sympathetically. "Why don't you tell me what's been happening."

She started further back than he needed, but he listened anyway as she seemed to need to unload a barrage of pent-up emotions. Ron had had an affair a couple of years earlier and as part of their solution as they worked through it, they'd moved down to D.C. Fresh start. But then he'd taken on a new project that had him going out of town frequently and Kelly no longer knew if she could trust him.

"He became distant again and I could tell something was going on. I kicked him out because I'm supposed to be better than this, you know?"

"When?"

"Couple days before Karen and Marcus Martin went missing. Got called to that crime scene and thought it was a bit of bad luck for Ron, but kind of felt happy that something shitty was going down for him. And then I found out the timeline for things and that Karen worked at that bakery. Ron would bring home crap from there all of the time. I'm no FBI investigator, but a cop can put two and two together, Seeley."

"Kelly, I need you to cut to the chase, now. Is he involved in the whole Martin mess?"

"You mean did he kill Martin? Or maybe even Karen?"

Booth could only give her a steady gaze within his professional persona. He couldn't let personal feelings get in the way.

"Yes he's involved with the whole thing, but he didn't kill anyone. He couldn't have." Tears began streaming down her cheeks. "Oh God, Seeley, I don't have any proof and he won't talk to me directly, but I just know he couldn't have done _that_."

In spite of himself, Booth reached out and took Kelly's hand in his own and for her sake, hoped she was right.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Booth tossed his cards and notebook on the coffee table in a tired frustration, then sat back with his beer and took off his already loosened tie. He hadn't taken the time to change yet and the bag of chips by his side was not really cutting it for helping him renew a little energy for a final push before he hit the sack. Taking on Kelly's pain had not really been what he had bargained for; not without guilt did he almost wish she had been more involved so that it would have been a simple arrest and interrogation.

He decided upon hauling himself up to change and find something better to eat when he heard a knock at his door. He glanced at his watch as he made his way to the door and opened it.

"Bones! Hey, what are you doing here?" He stepped back to allow her in.

"I thought you might like to hear about what we found out at the lab."

"Yeah," he said encouragingly, "yeah … you want a beer?"

Thinking of the conversation ahead, Brennan agreed with a definitive "yes."

Booth gave her a little half smile. "Sounds like your past couple of hours might have been like mine."

"Nothing matches the physical evidence, Booth. No particle traces, no blood, and none of the tools match the wound. You were right not to arrest Kenneth Martin, I shouldn't have acted so irrationally."

Booth handed her the beer and tried to will his heart to slow down. Bones looking slightly vulnerable was one of her more beautiful expressions. Any expression that she took on without consciousness brought out the best in her. Deep thought, surprised joy, anger – those were his other favorites, followed closely by every other combination. "Happens to the best of us," he offered easily. "But you could have told me all that on the phone. What's going on, Bones?"

She looked at him leaning casually against the entrance to his kitchen, sleeves now only haphazardly rolled up, accentuating the taut muscles that reached from shoulder to fingertip and tried unsuccessfully to imagine the mostly confident, powerful agent in front of her as a powerless young boy that needed protection from his own father. "Booth…what I said, earlier, about your father…I didn't mean to…"

He straightened himself up and waved her off. "Look, it doesn't matter. You were right. He left. Good riddance. Whatever."

She looked at him sadly. "Do you really mean that?"

"Do I really mean what?"

"That it doesn't matter? That it's good that Hank kicked him out? Because you told me that my dad leaving me _does_ matter but that I should forgive him."

"It's not the same situation."

"You say you wouldn't leave Parker for anything, that you'd find a way to make things work. My father left me anyway. He _didn't_ find the way to make it work. Your father didn't even argue with Hank when he told him to get out. You are correct in that it is not the same situation, but our fathers are the same in that they abandoned their children."

"Yeah, but did your father try to beat the crap out of you every day?" His voice rose in volume with his bitter tone and unexpected retort. "He left you to _protect_ you and he came back to _protect_ you. _Big_ difference between our dads there, Bones." He paced away from her a few steps in order to regain some control over where this conversation was going. He'd thought Bones' outburst earlier had only really been about Oscar and Liam. He didn't know what to do with this new possibility, that she'd been also thinking about his past and not just her own.

"How do you know what happened, anyway?"

"Hank. He told me how he came to your house that day and saw you and your dad… I think he feels guilty for his responsibility in sending him away." She recognized the unfortunate similarity between Booth and his grandfather in carrying these burdens. "He wasn't sure how to tell you and I promised I would. But I didn't mean—"

"It's okay," he interrupted. "I mean, I was there, right? I know what happened." He'd reached an opposite wall and rested his weight on his arm along it, feeling suddenly exhausted. "It's fine."

"You don't sound like it's fine," she said gently. "You've told me before that you loved your father – unless…" Brennan felt completely out of her realm of experience with this whole conversation. It was all coming out wrong.

"Unless what?" God, he really didn't want to be talking about this, but she'd come this far, he might as well find out where she was going with it all.

"Unless you always said that to make me feel better about my own father." He looked at her with a sort of wry half-smile, but no mirth reached his eyes.

"No. Maybe. I don't know." He looked down for a moment before feeling Bones' presence at his side and in a completely unexpected gesture, she placed a cool hand along the side of his face, gently turning it back up towards her own. It was wholly unlike her, but it felt – right. He swallowed his heart as he lost himself for a moment in her shimmering grey-green depths. "Where are you going with all of this, Bones? I'm feeling like I need something more here to figure out what it is you want."

Looking into his deep brown eyes that now searched into her own and feeling the strong jaw along her palm, she felt no doubts about what she really wanted, but also realized how to explain herself to him. "I want to understand you better so that I can help you deal with tough cases like you do with me. You set your feelings aside, but I can tell that cases like this one bother you."

Booth dropped his arm from along the wall to take the hand at his face into his own, but still keeping them both along his neck and shoulder as his other hand instinctively wrapped lightly about her waist at her hip. Bones' free hand came up to hold onto his arm. The intimacy of the moment overtook him as he pulled her in and kissed her, softly, reveling in the response as Bones held onto him tighter and prolonged the moment.

"Thank you," he said in a near whisper.

"For kissing you?"

He smiled at the predicted reaction and this time it reached his eyes. "No, for wanting to help me. For not only wanting to support what we do together, but for supporting _me._"

"I will always support _you_, Booth."

Had there been any doubts before, they all directly fell way. They didn't miss it. _Now_ was their moment.


	14. Chapter 14

_**Author's Note: First of all, thanks to jenlovesbones and andreuuchis/angiebc for some Brennan feedback. I have a lot of Brennan in me, but I have a whole lot more Booth, so it is nice to get multiple perspectives. Second of all, for some reason, I feel the need to simply say, "trust me" for one small section of this chapter. If you read this chapter and feel no worries, then this request doesn't apply to you. Haha! **___

_**Chapter 14**_

Booth kissed her again with a deeper intensity and when they parted he chuckled lightly.

"What are you laughing about?"

"This," he kissed her again, "wasn't supposed to happen until our date tomorrow."

"Quite presumptuous of you, don't you think, to assume this would have happened at all?" she smiled back at him. "Perhaps our date would not have gone well or maybe I would not have let you kiss me."

"Not a chance," Booth said confidently. "And I'll prove it to you tomorrow night."

Brennan matched his confidence with a challenging tilt of her head, studying the facial features that remained only inches from her own. She considered the transformation he underwent from just a few moments ago. "Booth, I'm sorry about your dad."

She watched his eyes grow a little sad, while still holding her own. "Yeah, me too," he said. She debated whether or not to press. She wanted to know more, but was also aware of his limitations. She opted for a different angle, instead.

"So, should we talk about us?"

Booth smiled. "I don't know. Is that what you want?"

"Sweets might say that we should."

"Do you think we could leave Sweets out of this for once? We don't need him to go all shrinky on us. We're just two people ready to move forward together, right?"

Brennan smoothed a hand along his chest, causing Booth to breathe slightly faster. "Yes," she answered assuredly.

The relief Booth felt was almost overwhelming. In spite of the confidence he had been wearing recently, it had still felt like a cloak over the many uncertainties that had lain beneath. In an effort to move past more self-exposure, Booth reached for their beers and suggested they move to sit on the couch.

"But, you know," Booth said as they sat down, shoulder-to-shoulder, "he might be right. What do you think?"

"I want to be with you and you want to be with me." Her face mirrored her shoulder shrug.

"Right?" Booth agreed. "Two plus two equals four."

"Except in this case, it's really one plus one," she gave a little gesture to indicate the two of them and Booth was about to slide in a comment when he saw the twinkle in her eyes. He smirked and clinked his bottle against hers.

"So," Brennan said in a change of tone after taking a drink, "you haven't told me what happened with Kelly," Brennan said.

Booth leaned forward, resting his arms on his knees. "She doesn't know much. She feels convinced that Ron couldn't be involved with Marcus' death or potentially Karen's, but you and I both know that doesn't really mean anything."

Brennan joined him in leaning forward on the edge of the couch and gave a thoughtful raise of her eyebrows. "You are correct. However, we have encountered exceptions. What do you think? Do you trust Kelly?"

Booth gave a surprised laugh. "Wow, Bones. You are spilling out surprises right and left tonight. You're really what my gut is telling me?"

"I prefer the term intuition as it is more precise – or at least as precise as something like intuition can actually be – but yes. I think you know by now that I am willing to listen to your guesswork, especially when you follow it up with your thought process that leads to those guesses. So, what do you think?"

"Honestly? I don't know. I think I believe Kelly isn't directly involved – except for the obstruction of justice charge I had to file – but I couldn't say about Ron, not having ever met the guy. On paper, I'd just say he is some schmuck that cheats on his wife and kids and thinks he can keep getting away with it. But, he's playing it smarter than I'd give him credit for. He doesn't talk to Kelly directly and has been working his job remotely and doing it well enough to be beyond skepticism from the other members of his firm."

"He's smart enough to know that his wife might try to record his calls or trace his calls. I don't understand why she would keep covering for him for so long. Surely this will cost Kelly her job, won't it?"

"Love." Booth looked directly into Brennan's eyes and wove his fingers in with hers. She found that she could not argue with his answer. Considering all that she had done for Booth or said on his behalf, she knew it had always been because of her love for him. Would she continue to do the same if she suspected Booth of wrongdoing?

"And you're right," Booth continued. "She probably will lose her job, but maybe formal charges will be dropped. She offered up her phone for forensic analysis as well as her daughters' and has offered to disclose everything she knows or suspects. Ron shouldn't really be that hard to track down. We'll probably be able to bring him in tomorrow or Sunday."

The weight of the day bore down of them, but neither had much desire to actually separate from one another, especially now, after crossing this new threshold. Booth felt almost as if he might lose the moment if he let go of Bones' hand, but did not fight her when she indicated that she should go. He stood with her and walked with her to the door, pulling her into another kiss that might have been enough to compel her to stay if it were another evening, perhaps even the next evening. However, for tonight, he let her slip away and out the door.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

When Brennan told Booth she trusted him in being kept in the dark about their upcoming date, she was not lying. But she had to admit that she had been more nervous about it than she cared to admit – that is, until last night. Last night was…satisfying. She smiled to herself imagining Booth arguing with her choice of words, but 'satisfied' was precisely how she felt and wouldn't want it to be any less than this. Of course, she also felt happy and eager as well, especially as she anticipated what Booth considered worthy of their first date.

Remembering when they met Kelly for dinner earlier in the week and Booth's request at the time that she wear green, she chose a blouse with this sentiment in mind. She'd put extra time into giving her hair a curl, wisping her bangs to the side. She felt a sudden surge of dopamine and norepinephrine course through her as she thought of Booth's arrival and imagined his arms encircling her waist and allowing herself to become immersed within him. The knock at the door hastened to make this thought a reality.

She opened the door to see him dressed in a navy button down shirt, untucked, with a black jacket and carrying a bottle of champagne. His smile was as wide as it ever was with his eyes immediately finding her own. He stepped in and with one arm snaking around her waist and the other hand cupping the back of her neck and head, he greeted her with a kiss that she leaned into, her own hands mirroring his.

"You are beautiful," Booth said as they parted.

"I know," Brennan replied with an arch smile, then looked at the bottle Booth was still holding. "Champagne? Customarily, champagne is reserved for very special occasions and unique celebrations."

"You and me, Bones. We are definitely a unique celebration, but let's leave it to chill and we can open it to celebrate the end of our evening. Are you ready to go? We have a bit of a schedule to keep…oh, and you might want a jacket or a wrap or something. It gets cold on the water." He gave her a charm smile like only he could and ushered her out the door.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Their first stop was a fulfillment of a promise of sorts. Booth had told Bones that he would try to arrange for a visit with Oscar and Liam in their emergency foster home so that she could feel confident that they were safe and well cared for. Of course, this was before he fully understood that she had been more preoccupied with his past rather than the two boys, but regardless, he didn't think it would hurt to follow through on the visit.

To his eye and instinct, Booth felt their foster parents were good, honest, caring people. Liam seemed as full of bouncing energy as when they had first met him, starting their visit off with high fives and a running narrative of all that they had been doing with the Thompsons, which hadn't been anything out of the ordinary, but for a child starved of attention, it meant the world to have those ordinary moments.

Oscar remained subdued, but didn't avoid Booth's questions and answered with honesty that the Thompsons were a decent couple.

"It's okay to feel guilty about your relief at being in a safe place," Booth told him. "Maybe your dad will figure himself out and maybe he won't, but you and Liam, you deserve this, okay? Let the Thompsons share some of the responsibility now." Oscar gave a noncommittal nod, but returned the fist Booth offered.

Brennan slipped her hand into Booth's as they made their way back to the SUV. "Thank you."

"So, did Cassidy do okay? I noticed you were doing a good job of interrogating Darryl and Meg."

"I am satisfied that Oscar and Liam are in a solid and safe home with people who will adequately care for their needs."

Booth opened the car door for Brennan and as she slid into her seat, Booth turned upon hearing Oscar call out his name.

Booth met Oscar halfway on the sidewalk. "You said to tell you if there was anything else I could think of about Marcus that might help." Booth gave him an encouraging nod and Oscar continued. "I don't know if it will help much, but that one guy I was telling you about? That Matt guy?" Booth nodded again. "I think Marcus was up to no good with him. You know like drugs or something."

"Thanks," Booth said. "You still got my card, right? You call me about anything else and I don't just mean about Marcus, alright?" Oscar agreed and Booth walked around and joined Brennan in the truck.

Their next stop was at a dock in Georgetown, to set sail on a tour boat along the Potomac to Alexandria where they would have dinner, then sail back again for the second half of the tour.

"Parker helped me plan this one. He suggested you'd like a trip to a museum and I kind of, you know, laughed a little bit, but then we found this. It's a tour of the monuments and I know I kind of know all about them and you probably already know everything about what the guide will tell us, but it's a nice boat ride and –"

"Booth," Brennan pressed her fingers to his lips. "It's perfect."

"Yeah?"

Brennan simply hooked an arm around his and they boarded. As the tour got underway, they both found that while it was true that they were not learning much new information about the Washington Monument or the Jeffersonian Memorial, the setting sun and view from the water definitely gave the view of the landmarks a beautiful slant. Brennan frequently added her own facts to the information narrated by their guide. It was just as it should be.

"I think they are forgetting something about the Lincoln Memorial," Brennan remarked.

"And what is that?"

"It is prone to drunken FBI agents secretly supporting civil disobedience."

Booth chuckled, moved behind Brennan to wrap his arms around her, resting his cheek alongside hers, soaking up this moment that didn't seem quite real to him, loving her memory, loving her.

The boat docked in Alexandria and it was a short walk to the restaurant, Chart House, which was also on the waterfront. As Booth opened the door for Brennan, he leaned in and whispered quickly, "I may have used your name for the reservation," then gently ushered her inside before him.

With her puzzled look, Booth expanded. "They usually want reservations a week in advance and I didn't have that, so I figured using your name would help." He shot her a little cocky half smile. "And it did."

"I am a famous author and you are a very resourceful investigator, so it stands to reason that the combination would be successful."

"Exactly. You and me, Bones, we make an excellent team."

Dinner fell into an easy routine. The pair had shared countless meals together and that night's meal, though more formal, still reflected who they were and how they enjoyed each other's company with jokes, some talk about their current case, Brennan giving Booth an anthropology lesson and him teaching her about basketball. Perhaps the only difference was that Booth reached for Brennan's hand, she allowed him to take it, and the looks they shared were no longer ones of "what if", but "what _is_".

Walking back to the dock, Brennan stopped Booth and to his happy surprise, she pulled him into a deep kiss, full of passion and feelings once masked, now fully unveiled. Pausing for air and before he could think to hold them in, he breathed the words into her mouth, "I love you." And though he had never before spoken these words aloud to her, he knew them to have been true for almost as long as he could remember while being with her. He also knew that she might not be able to say these words back to him, but he _felt_ them, even if she could not fully bring them to light. Her kiss in response was enough evidence.

"We have champagne ready for us back at your place," Booth smiled into her eyes.

"Let's not keep it waiting."


	15. Chapter 15

_**Chapter 15**_

Brennan awoke with the immediate knowledge that everything was different. Lying on her side, she smiled at the "everything" next to her. Technically, of course, very little was different. Her bed was the same, time still continued on as it had, the sun was on the rise as it always was. Booth was still Booth and she was still Brennan. But waking up next to Booth was definitely a variance and sometimes the smallest changes could cause the largest effects.

Last night had been quite fulfilling.

They had shared a glass or two of champagne. They had made small talk. They had kissed each other. Booth had seemed hesitant at first to take things further, but when she had removed his jacket for him, he responded with his full confidence. And the results? The way she felt now reminded her of how Booth would say that it was never 'just sex'. She had never wanted to agree with him, thinking that this may be true for him, but not all humans felt that way. She passed a hand over his pectoral muscles, causing him to stir and open his eyes with a content smile, which he then passed over to her as he turned his head to gaze into her eyes, holding her hand in place.

Booth could hardly contain the happiness within him. Waking up next to Bones was… well it was more than he had thought would ever happen. And now she was looking as beautiful as ever with her tousled hair and a smile that caused his heart to pound uncontrollably. He didn't trust himself to say anything yet, so he didn't use words. Turning to her and pulling her in, he found words unnecessary; she understood him completely.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

"So, remember when Oscar called me back just before we left their house yesterday?" Booth asked while gently stroking Brennan's shoulder as she lay in his arms.

"Yes."

"He told me he thought this Matt or Mike or whoever kid that Marcus was meeting might have been into drugs or something."

"So, you suspect Matt or Mike?"

"I don't know if I do or not. He's just a new slant to the case, right? I mean, I'm still not taking Kenneth Martin off the suspect list, but maybe there's this other angle that will take us somewhere."

"We haven't found any evidence at all that links directly to Kenneth Martin."

"Yeah, I get that, I really do. And you're probably right that Martin didn't do it. Do we know if Marcus was killed on site or elsewhere?"

"Based upon the surrounding soil that was severely disrupted due to the excavation and dump into the truck, I believe Hodgins determined that there was not a high enough saturation level of blood or other fluids for him to have bled out on site."

"But so far, you haven't found anything on him to suggest any obvious locations?"

"That is correct. Although, Hodgins is still working at identifying incomplete particles that seem to belong to different pollens and insects."

"Bones, let's go see if we can find this Matt kid. We'll have better luck finding and talking to him at his house than at the high school, if he really is a high school student."

"Now?" Brennan asked in surprise.

Booth had already jumped up out of bed. "Yeah – well," he kneeled back in and dipped down to give Brennan a provocative kiss, "maybe after we shower and I make you an amazing breakfast."

She gave him an amused smile. Actually, she felt quite pleased with his desire to dive back into the case. It was evidence that he didn't feel the pressure of choosing between partnership or relationship and reassured her that she would not have to make that same choice either. "I would like that. However, I think I should be the one to prepare our meal as I have seen what constitutes a good breakfast in your eyes."

Booth smirked and ran kisses down her neck and into the dip at her collarbone. "Carbs are good for replenishing energy, Bones – especially considering our workout last night and just this morning." She gave a light chuckle, a carefree laugh that felt like music to Booth's ears as he made his way to the shower.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

In spite of Booth's desire to hit the pavement for the case, they enjoyed a leisurely breakfast together, then stopped by his apartment to allow him to change clothing. Angela had narrowed down four numbers from the scrap of paper found on Marcus, determining them to be the best candidates. Booth ran them and with a little extra digging, he landed on a Claire Derekson who had a son, Matt. He seemed like he might match the profile based upon the vague details from Oscar.

They made the trip out to Matt's neighborhood, Booth explaining that Matt was using a phone that was on his mother's plan. "Gotta tell ya, Mom ain't gonna be too happy if he's been using that same phone for drug deals."

"Maybe we can use her as a leveraging token if Matt won't talk to us."

"Leveraging… a bargaining chip, right." He gave her a little smile.

"I suppose you will use this suspect as another excuse to use as your bargaining chip to further stall Parker's efforts for a cell phone."

"He's ten. What's he need a cell phone for? And I don't need a bargaining chip. I'm his father. What I say, goes."

Brennan smirked at his misguided pronouncement, but addressed his question. "There are several practical and safety reasons for him to have a cell phone, all of which I would think a law enforcement officer such as yourself would already know and validate."

"Yeah, but then what if he does something dumb like trying to text while riding his bike around? I mean he already broke his arm _purposely _trying to do something dangerous. Then he's going to be texting and playing games on it in class when he should be listening to his teachers even though they're not supposed to have phones in school – "

"Which is a ridiculous injunction considering that public institutions claim to be short on funding for technology and children are walking into the schools with technology in hand."

"Yeah, it's really great to have kids searching unfiltered porn sites on their phones when they're supposed to be figuring out a math problem," Booth countered sarcastically.

"Is that what you think Parker would be doing?"

"God, I hope not, but I was ten once. Boys are curious, you know?"

"It's perfectly natural, Booth."

"Yeah, I know that – what, are you the school counselor now?"

"I'm making you uncomfortable."

Booth simply rolled his eyes.

Brennan gave him a sidelong glance. "I find your discomfort to be somewhat surprising given the nature of our sexual encounters earlier."

Unable to help himself, Booth gave her a wicked grin as he took her hand. "And we've only just begun."

Brennan gave a playful smile in return as they pulled up to the Derekson's apartment complex.

The building was nondescript – standard beige stucco with darker brown trim, corner units had balconies. The security door was propped open, so Booth and Brennan went directly to the Derekson's door. Claire opened the door to Brennan's knock, chain in place. Booth flashed his badge. "I'm Special Agent Seeley Booth. This here is my partner, Dr. Temperance Brennan. Are you Claire Derekson?"

She nodded and closed the door to unchain it and invite them in. The apartment was tidy, but simply furnished. Booth gave a standard, cursory glance around and saw inside what was probably Claire's bedroom, but could only see a crack through a second bedroom, which looked normal enough. Claire herself was a small woman, but exuded a self-sufficient strength of one who looked to have been on her own for quite some time.

"How can I help you?"

"Matt is your son?" Claire nodded warily at Booth's question. "Is he around so that we can talk to him?"

"What is this about?"

"We'd just like to ask him a few questions about a current investigation."

"What do you mean, a 'current investigation'? Are you investigating my son? Do you suspect him of something?"

They tried to assure her that Matt was not under direct investigation, but could possibly help with uncovering more information regarding Marcus Martin's disappearance and murder. Had she ever seen Matt with Marcus before? Booth showed her a picture.

"Oh, this is the son of that poor man whose wife is missing, too? And didn't they lose another little boy a year or two back?" Sympathy won out and Claire was much more forthcoming. Matt wasn't home, he was probably at the QuickMart – he spent a lot of time there with his friends after school and on weekends. One of his best friends worked there, too. Claire also verified that Matt was home during the time of Marcus' death.

Booth and Brennan thanked her and headed out to the QuickMart down the road where they easily spotted Matt. As they approached him, Booth verified his identity. "Matt Derekson?"

"Who wants to know?"

Booth pulled out his badge, "FBI, Mr. tough—" Matt started to make a run for it, but Booth reached out and caught his arm before he got anywhere. "Not too bright, kid. If you're going to make a run for it, it's usually helpful to run in the _opposite_ direction of the law," Booth told him in annoyance as he pulled out his cuffs. He led him over to the SUV.

"Look, help us out with some information and I won't dig into the drugs. Right now I'm more concerned with finding out who killed Marcus Martin."

Matt's eyes grew wide. "Dude, I didn't have nothing to do with _that_. I tried to help that kid out. He got himself in over his head with some other dude. Wanted to blackmail him."

Booth and Brennan exchanged glances that recognized they might be hitting upon something big. "Why don't you start at the top?"

Marcus had started coming by the store about a month ago and Matt hadn't given him much thought on account of his age, but he had picked a fight one day and they sort of became friends after that. Marcus kept talking about wanting to get out of his dad's house, but needed some quick cash. He had been hesitant about getting involved with selling drugs, but then talked about how his mom had met some guy who kept promising them stuff, but never followed through. He wanted to buy some stuff to plant on the guy and force him to make good on his promises.

"Did he connect with him?" Brennan asked. 

"I don't know. Day before he disappeared was when he said he was gonna catch him."

"Do you know where he was going to meet him?"

"Don't know that, either."

Matt's story of being home studying that same night matched up with his mother's and Booth freed him of the handcuffs and gave him his card should Matt actually feel enlightened to share more information if it came to him.

"This isn't looking good for Ron, is it?" Brennan asked Booth.

Booth shook his head. "Nope. Not at all."


	16. Chapter 16

_**Chapter 16**_

Though they did not conduct any more business on the case that day, Booth and Brennan found that they did not care to separate; for when two people initially decide they want to be together, they do not want to be apart for even a moment. They picked up a light lunch and ate on the Mall, took a walk when Booth could not still any longer, stopped at Brennan's place for an overnight bag, shopped for groceries for their dinner, then ended up at Booth's apartment for the balance of the day.

As right as it all felt, Booth knew that they were not 'home free'. As confident as he was in his intuition, he had clearly realized that his instincts were not always to be trusted when it came to love. Not that he didn't know when _he_ was in love, but having the faith when others felt the same way? That had obviously become the snag over the years. He _did_ know that when Bones made a decision, she was all in. And yet, he knew there was more beyond this decision.

However, he wasn't ready to have that conversation yet. He wanted to enjoy the simplicity of their relationship at this stage, before the inevitable complications that had always defined them intruded.

Brennan caught the expression on his face as they ate the dinner they had cooked together and relaxed into the warmth his eyes conveyed. It was not much different than so many other times that he had looked at her the same way, except now there were no walls between them. She gave him a slow smile. "What are you thinking about?"

Booth's smile changed to reflect more mischief as he replied, "I'm thinking of page 187 and I believe that we should make a new page to put into your next book."

Her throaty laugh was all that Booth needed to initiate the plan.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

The next morning, the partners approached the glass doors that marked the entrance to the Medico-Legal lab when Booth stopped Brennan.

"Bones – wait. We never really talked about how we'd, you know, handle our new relationship with everyone else."

Brennan darted a quick glance over to the platform to see the full contingent present. Angela saw them gave her a smile in hello. Brennan turned back to Booth and a slow smile emerged just before she gently tugged on his tie to pull him in and kiss him. His hands dropped to her waist and held her there as he returned it. As they pulled away, Booth returned the smile. "That'll work," he said. They released their hold on each other and turned to keep walking towards the lab podium with Booth straightening his tie.

As they walked up the steps, Cam gave them a warm grin, Angela had her hands clasped together under her chin in glee, while Hodgins gave Booth and appreciative smile and said, "_Dude._" Booth merely smirked in return.

Clark spoke for all of them, "Well, it's about time. Good for you Dr. Brennan, Agent Booth."

Brennan cleared her throat and pressed on, "It would appear that you might have information to share with us? Is that why everyone is gathered together right now?"

"Right," Cam said rather vaguely then snapped her focus back to the case. "_Right._ So, DNA results are processed, but don't share any traits with Marcus at all, which only tells us that it isn't his blood or either of his parents'. But it is a solid sample for comparison purposes. Dr. Hodgins and Dr. Edison have a bit more, though."

"Yeah," Hodgins jumped in first. "After analyzing some of the remaining particulates that didn't fit right in with the larger quantities of nitrates, phosphorous, and _poa pratensis_, it seemed like there was an odd combination of particles and spores. There was _platanus, leptosphaeria, coprinus—_"

"Skip to the end," Booth interjected.

"It's a huge combination of a lot of pollen spores from a sweeping variety of trees, grasses, and molds. I mean, a collection so vast, it seemed highly unlikely that it all had gathered on a single household garden tool," Hodgins clarified.

Brennan's eyebrows knitted together as she began processing Hodgins' information. Booth could tell that she was suddenly onto something just before she made a move over to the remains.

"Dr. Edison, I assume Dr. Hodgins' findings led you to similar conclusions that I am coming to now?"

"Yes, Dr. Brennan, I believe so."

Booth looked at Angela, who rolled her eyes in sympathy with him. "Bones, _what_ conclusions are those? You gotta share with the world."

In response, she pulled the magnifier scope over the occipital bone. "The depth and angle of the injury makes it easy for us to believe that a common household garden implement or related tool could make this impact. What we could not determine specifically is how thick the weapon might have been. All we know is that it was at least as thick as the skull because of the even scoring in the injury. Dr. Edison, I believe, discovered something else, though. Isn't that correct?"

"Yes, Dr. Brennan. If you look closely, the very tip of the entry is angled slightly higher, almost as if it slipped."

"What does that mean?" Booth asked.

"It indicates that the weapon was probably larger, either such that it would be harder for the murderer to hold and control or possibly that the victim fell or landed on something, with the weight of his own body influencing that slip."

"And what does that mean?" Booth asked again.

"It means," Cam saved him, "that combined with what Hodgins discovered, that the murder weapon could be something found on a construction site."

Booth had his light bulb moment. "Oh – like the claws of a digger of some sort?"

"Right."

Booth slapped his hands together enthusiastically. "Ron was due to make a visit to the construction site…perhaps things went wrong with Marcus' attempt to blackmail him. I'm going to see where my guys are at with rousting up Ron and get going on readying some warrants to search his place and get a DNA sample." He caught Brennan's eye. "Pick you up later for lunch?"

A part of her wanted to scowl at this assumption of his, that suddenly they should automatically have lunch together, but couldn't help agreeing as she felt his warm, hopeful gaze. His grin in response could not have been wider as he turned to leave.

He trotted down the steps and started to pull out his phone in order to check in with the status on Ron, but Cam's voice interrupted him.

"Seeley!"

He paused, spun around, and gave her a knowing look. "Yes, Camille?"

"C'mon, spill."

Booth merely laughed and shook his head. "Not going there right now, Camille. Maybe you'll get more out of Bones." He raised his eyebrows at her and walked away, still chuckling.

Brennan's eyes had followed Booth's retreating form as well as Cam's hastily made excuse to go talk to him. She was curious about what Booth would say to her and attempted to follow that situation as Angela sidled up next to her.

"Sweetie! You and Booth? When did this happen? Wait, _how_ did this happen? And, has it _all_ happened? Was it totally hot? I've always imagined that Booth would be really great in-"

"Ange!" Hodgins interjected.

"Oh, right. Sorry honey, I forgot you were still here."

Brennan had barely been paying attention as she smiled in satisfaction at seeing Booth shake his head at Cam before continuing out the door. What was theirs was still theirs.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Back at his office, Booth was informed that they had found where Ron had been staying, but not Ron, himself. Ron's office had not heard from him since last Thursday. Booth was able to put through warrants for his home residence, his office, and for the potential DNA sample they would need to swab. Pulling his financials, Booth could see why it was easy enough to track Gorman down. He was smart enough to use cash, but not always smart enough to monitor where he withdrew that cash. Aside from mostly regular cash withdrawals in amounts that corresponded to food and lodging, there was not much that really stood out, except for a much larger amount right before Marcus' death. Coupled with the mounting evidence that the Jeffersonian team was gathering, Booth was feeling more confident with Ron as being an extremely viable suspect.

Lunchtime came around quickly and Booth found himself unaccountably nervous while simultaneously feeling more excited than he ever had been for a simple lunch with his partner. He realized that being together as just the two of them over the weekend was not quite like being together in the presence of others. Everything was the same and yet it was all completely different. It was an oh-so-good nervousness.

He pulled up to the Jeffersonian and texted his arrival. When she slid into her seat they leaned into each other for a kiss that slipped into an unexpectedly hungry passion. "Maybe we should take a long lunch," Booth joked as they broke away.

"I confess that your idea _does_ sound appealing," Brennan's eyes twinkled at him. "But…"

Booth merely raised his eyebrows in anticipation.

Brennan released an uncharacteristic sigh. "But I'd never hear the end of it today from Angela." Booth laughed as he put the truck in gear to drive and Brennan continued, "She has been most persistent for details all morning. I welcome our lunch if for no other reason than it gave me a reasonable excuse to slip away from her."

"Why don't you just give her what she wants?"

Brennan remained quiet a moment, unsure of Booth's cavalier reaction. Perhaps she had misunderstood what she had seen transpire between him and Cam earlier? Was she being unreasonable in her expectation to keep things to themselves?

"What is it, Bones?" Booth asked gently.

"I'm not like Angela," she replied. "I don't talk about every moment that I experience and what we experienced this weekend…" She felt Booth's strong hand wrap around hers reassuringly.

"I don't want to share you with anyone else right now, either," Booth told her.

Brennan squeezed his hand in return, relieved that she had not misread him after all.

Booth parked the SUV and catching up with Brennan on the sidewalk, they interlaced their fingers together as they walked to the diner. They ran into Sweets, who seemed to be leaving the diner with lunch to go.

"Agent Booth! Dr. Brennan! Were you just coming to eat?"

"Yes, but it looks like you have your lunch to go – in a rush? Guess we'll catch you some other time. Bye now." Booth sing-songed quickly as they moved past Sweets.

Sweets swung around. "Actually—" he paused as he noticed the partners holding hands and his eyes widened at the implications of this intimate gesture. "—actually, no, I'm not in a hurry at all." He followed them inside. "And if I'm not mistaken, it looks like we have a lot to talk about."

Booth stopped walking and turned around to Sweets quickly, who nearly crashed into Booth in the process. "No, no we don't. We don't have anything to talk about. Right Bones?"

Brennan gave a nonchalant shake of her head. "Nope. I don't see that there's anything to discuss."

"Right, see that Sweets? Nothing." Booth followed Brennan to their usual table.

Booth rolled his eyes as Sweets joined them. "Look, Sweets, we can talk about our current case, but that's it, okay?"

"But—"

Booth glared at him and Sweets slumped in his chair in defeat. "Alright, then how about you tell me what you're doing about these harassment complaints that Kenneth Martin has been lodging against you?"

Brennan's eyebrows came together in concerned confusion. "Booth? You didn't tell me about this."

Booth shrugged unconcernedly. "This kind of thing happens all the time. It's nothing to worry about."

"Except, Agent Booth, Martin seems a bit unstable. It might not be a bad idea to watch your step around him."

Booth didn't look up from his menu as he replied, "I haven't done anything to worry about and I sure as hell am not going to let a man who beats on his wife and kid keep me from doing my job."

"Right, I just meant that sometimes these kinds of cases can arouse a lot of emotions in even the best of circumstances and I wouldn't want to see any of Martin's charges to actually merit any true investigation."

Brennan frowned at Sweets. "Your worries are completely unnecessary, Sweets. I assure you Booth has not acted in any way that would be classified as harassment. I find it insulting that such charges are even being allowed to be filed."

Booth gave a small smile. "Bones, don't worry about it. It's not a big deal. It's just a complaint. No charges are being made."

Satisfied with his answer, they ordered, ate their lunch and tried discussing the case, but felt that they were in a holding pattern until they could clear the next hurdle with Ron. Booth asked Sweets if blackmail would be enough to make Ron desperate enough to kill. Before he could give his assessment, Booth received a call.

"C'mon Sweets, let's go find out in person. Kelly brought Ron in herself. They're waiting for us at the Hoover."


	17. Chapter 17

_**Author's Note: Many apologies for the wait for this current update. I have another project underway and simply could not let it go. This story is very near its end…**_

_**Interestingly (to me, anyway), I have had parts of this chapter and the next one written for quite some time, and I like how it has ended up paralleling, to some extent, recent events on the show. One can never guess that such a thing will happen, since it's not really my story to tell. I am only borrowing from the gracious (or not so gracious – haha!) creators.**_

_**Chapter 17**_

Ron Gorman was waiting in an interrogation room when they arrived, with Kelly pacing agitatedly outside in the hall. She approached Booth straightaway. "So, I brought him in personally. That's gotta count for something, right Seeley?"

"Yeah, it means you can watch the interview with Bones, here," Booth told her brusquely. He clapped a hand on Sweets' shoulder. "C'mon Sweets, you're with me."

Brennan gestured Kelly into the observation room. The cheerful demeanor that Brennan had last seen with Kelly had disappeared. Brennan wondered at Kelly's words with Booth. Had Booth made some sort of deal with her? If so, Kelly had clearly not met the terms based upon Booth's reaction.

"What do you think bringing in your husband should count for?"

"I thought he could ease up on me. All I was doing was trying to protect my husband and Seeley gets all goddamned cop on me," Kelly spat out.

"I don't understand. What did you expect him to do? You are an officer of the law, too. You broke the law; now there are consequences," Brennan looked at her with an expression that was both perplexed and disapproving.

Kelly merely scowled and said, "Look, save it for now. Can we listen in? I'd like to hear my dirtbag husband defend himself and prove his innocence."

Brennan turned up the volume as they heard Ron speaking in desperate tones.

"Oh God, I know it looks bad, but I swear I didn't _kill_ anyone. Jeez, he's just a kid! Why would I want to kill him?"

"People do any number of stupid things when they're trying to protect their comfortable lives. Sounds like Marcus was a threat to your happy home life, wasn't he? He was going to blackmail you with something - what was it, huh?" Booth pressed.

"Yes, it was drugs. He threatened to plant them on me or on the site so that the project might get shut down. He was upset because his mom told him some story that I would take them away somewhere. It was ridiculous. I hardly even _know_ this woman and I never met this kid before I saw him a couple of weeks ago."

Brennan looked over at Kelly. "I don't understand. I assumed that you convinced your husband to come in because you knew he was involved with Marcus and Karen's disappearance. Why is he lying to us right now?"

"Why are you assuming he is lying?" Kelly asked in irritation.

"Because we have evidence and eyewitnesses," Brennan said in near tandem with Booth on the other side of the window.

Kelly ignored the statement. "Here I thought I had always been attracted to the wrong Booth boy. Jared would have helped me out when I asked."

"And you both would have been wrong," Brennan stated unequivocally. "You should not take advantage of your past relationship with Booth to get you out of your mess. You're a police officer, I wouldn't think that I should have to explain something like that to you."

"Because you've never taken advantage of Booth for something like that? You can't imagine it until you're in that situation."

"Booth arrested my father for murder."

Kelly didn't have anything to say for a moment. "And you didn't ask him not to? Or to have someone else do it?"

"Of course not. He was right to do it."

Kelly snorted in disgust at both Brennan's unruffled attitude as well as Booth's unrelenting push for justice, no matter the cost. "And here I thought Seeley had heart. Guess I was wrong."

"You _are_ wrong. Do you think it is _easy_ for him to do the right thing? That he _wanted_ to arrest my father? It is not up to us to choose what is right or wrong or which laws to follow."

"Nothing is black and white. I tried to explain to Seeley that Ron wasn't doing anything wrong and that _I_ wasn't doing anything wrong. I asked him not to file any charges and now my whole career is ruined. Did I think our friendship in the past counted for something? Yeah, I did. I guess he wouldn't even help _you_ if you asked." Bitterness poured out of Kelly.

"He might," Brennan said, thinking separately of New Orleans, Russ, and Jared. "But the difference is that I would never ask him to put his career on the line for me. He has worked his whole life to do the right thing and protect others in spite of the cost to himself. What have you done for him to deserve that honor?"

Booth and Sweets walked into the observation room at that moment, startling the two women, who had ceased to notice that the interrogation was over. The tension was thick between Brennan and Kelly, causing the two men to exchange glances uncertainly.

"Bones? Everything alright in here?"

"Yes, Booth. Why wouldn't it be? So, did he kill Marcus?"

Booth gave her a confused look. "Weren't you listening?" Brennan was about to explain, but Booth eyed them both again and decided to find out later what had transpired between the two of them. "Look, it's okay. Let's go. I'll tell you all about it along the way." He turned to Sweets. "Sweets, can you, um…?" He darted his eyes towards Kelly.

"Yeah," Sweets jumped in. "Yeah, no problem."

Booth thanked him and ushered Brennan out.

"You'll tell me all about it on the way? Where are we going?"

"To the development site to see the foreman. Ron admitted to the developing affair with Karen and that he basically strung her along, making promises that he had no intention of keeping. I don't think he had a full idea of what Karen and Marcus were going through. Anyway, turns out Marcus followed Ron to the development site and tried to blackmail him with drugs. Ron said he blew him off, but the foreman overheard the conversation and got pretty upset. So, time to see if Ron's giving us the real scoop."

"This blackmailing attempt occurred the same day as the murder?"

"Yep. But we also got a DNA swab from Ron and Cam will run the test to see if it matches the blood we found on Marcus."

"What about Karen?"

"He's claiming not to have any idea about where she is. But I figure if we get one mystery solved, we might make some progress with the other. So, what was all that about with you and Kelly?"

"I don't know what you mean."

"C'mon, Bones. You two were ready to shoot daggers at each other."

"I was disturbed with how Kelly felt like she could take advantage of her relationship with you to try to get away with breaking the law. You didn't say that she had asked you to overlook her role in everything."

He shrugged. "Does it matter?"

Brennan considered this question. She realized that what mattered was how Booth chose to avoid casting his old friend in a poor light and simply took on the responsibility of doing his job. She didn't like it, but it was Booth through and through. She smiled at him and reached over to squeeze his arm. "No. Not at all."

Booth joined his hand up with her hand and wove his fingers among hers. "I've got a good feeling about this foreman…well, not a _good_ feeling if you know what I mean, but—"

"But you feel strongly that the foreman might be the actual murderer? Once again I marvel at your reliance almost entirely on your gut."

Booth merely laughed. "Admit it, it's one of the things you love about me." Of course, as soon as he spilled out the words, he wished he could take them back. He swore he wouldn't rush her and he hadn't meant to imply that she _did_ love him. He cleared his throat and tried to mask over the alarm that was surely plastered across his face. "I didn't mean… I just meant…" His phone rang and he nearly jumped in his seat.

"Booth."

"_Seeley,_" Rebecca's voice came through across the line, furious, upset. "I _told_ you what happened and _this_ is what you do?"

"What? What are you talking about? What did I do now?"

"I just got a visit from a social worker with Child Protection Services. It seems that _someone_ made an anonymous call to report me for negligence and possibly abuse. What was that show for me in the hospital? A way to catch me off guard? Why, Seeley, why?"

"Jesus, Rebecca, I have no idea what that hell you're talking about! I didn't make a call like that – I _wouldn't_. I _know_ what happened." Booth tried to slow down his heart rate and make sense of what was going on. "Can we just start over and you can tell me what's going on?"

Rebecca related to him about how a social worker stopped in for a surprise visit based upon a report that Parker's broken arm was not what it seemed. "I about lost it with her and Parker is so upset by the whole thing. Who would do this?"

Booth resisted the urge to angrily tell her that apparently she thought _he_ would, but clenched his jaw to help bite back the words. Truth was, Bones hit too close to home when she asked about Rebecca keeping Parker from him. He never _was_ fully confident that Rebecca wouldn't change her mind and revoke all his privileges with him. Fear of losing his son was something that stayed with him every day. But to think that she would believe he would do something like this?

"I don't know, but I'll get it figured out, okay? I promise."

"You'll get it figured out? You'll _fix it_, is what you'll do." She broke the connection.

Slamming the phone shut, Booth developed a quick idea of who might really be behind this whole mess: Kenneth Martin. Anger welled up in him at both him and Rebecca and he pulled the SUV over to the side of the road.

"Booth?" Brennan asked with concern. He seemed to be as close to exploding as she had seen him since the Broadsky affair. Before she could get any information out of him, he had unholstered his gun, placed it between their two seats and was already out the door. She stepped out of the truck, as well, and found him pacing agitatedly.

"Booth, what happened?"

He didn't answer right away as he tried to calm himself enough to repeat the conversation he'd just had with Rebecca. He continued to pace as he spit out a replay of what Rebecca had told him – had accused him of—and ended with a hard slam of his palm on the top of the SUV's hood.

Brennan took a step forward to him, but he held his palm up to her in a gesture to keep her distance. "Just…I'm really mad. Can you let me be mad for a second, here?"

As he lowered his hand again she captured it into her own, creating the precise effect that he hadn't wanted. The anger slid out of him with her touch that always calmed him without her knowing it. His shoulders slumped and he pulled her in tightly, holding onto her like a lifeline.

Brennan held Booth securely. He had been physically shaking with anger, and she waited for his heart rate to slow before allowing him to release her. The vulnerable fear in his eyes made her heart ache for him. She kissed him and he returned it with an almost desperate intensity, which eventually decreased to a more loving response.

"I love you so much," Booth told her quietly. "I know you can't say the same thing back to me and I don't care, Bones, I really don't. But I need you and will keep telling you how much I love you so that you don't ever forget it." He pulled her into another quick embrace and changed his tone. "Change of plans, Bones. We're not going to see the foreman, yet. I'd say that you shouldn't come with me for this detour, but the truth is, I think I really need you to come with me to make sure I don't do something even more stupid than what I'm about to do."

"I'm not leaving you," Brennan told him definitively. "What are we about to do?"

"We're going to visit Kenneth Martin so I can _fix_ this mess."


	18. Chapter 18

_**Chapter 18**_

Booth and Brennan were both tense on the drive to Martin's house and neither spoke. Brennan felt nervous, as she was not quite sure what Booth meant by "fixing" the mess. Booth felt nervous, as he was also not quite sure what he intended to do when he saw Martin, but he knew he couldn't just walk away from it. He felt his anger toward Rebecca dissipating somewhat; he understood that she was just scared and angry. He just wished they could get past their customary cycle of overreacting with one another. He opted for redirecting his anger toward Martin.

He pulled up to Martin's house and sat for a moment.

"Booth?" Brennan asked. "Are you having second thoughts about this?"

"No," he said with determination and got out of the truck. Walking around to meet Brennan, he pulled out his gun and handed it to her.

"Do you want me to shoot him?"

Booth couldn't deny the appeal of that offer and if the situation were slightly different, he might have afforded a chuckle. "Thanks, Bones, but no. I want you to hold onto my gun so that _I_ don't shoot him - but I also don't trust the guy."

They rang the doorbell.

Martin opened the door and looked upon them with condescension. "Agent Booth. I can't imagine what possible reason you have _this time_ for being here."

"MInd if we come in?" Without waiting for a reply, Booth stepped inside with a none-too-gentle nudge. "Right. I didn't think so."

"I figured you to be more intelligent than this, Agent Booth. You are making my harassment charges against you far too easy to impose—"

Booth spun around, grabbed Martin by the front of his shirt and shoved him up against the wall. Booth moved his arm so that it kept Martin pinned across his shoulders. "You think you've seen harassment? I have not even begun anything close to harassment. This? This is me reacting to a suspect who assaulted a federal officer. You want to understand harassment? I can find all kinds of ways to make that happen and not regret one moment of it on a child abusing, wife-beating scumbag like you. And best of all, I can get away with it. You feel powerful messing with my family? You don't have a chance in hell against me."

"Messing with your family, Agent Booth? I'm sure I don't know what you mean."

"Good, because I'm sure I don't know what _you_ mean when you say your own son was in danger from your wife, but you didn't do a damn thing about it." Booth pulled Martin forward by his shirt again, then turned him around, now holding him by the arm and back of his neck. "Maybe I know that Karen isn't to blame at all and I'll find ample reason—" he forced Martin to his living room, "—to toss around your perfect kingdom for weapons, fibers, and whatever other evidence I deem necessary to our investigation." Booth pushed Martin to the dining room and pressed him down onto the table. "I freeze your assets, search your office, and I hope to God you try to resist arrest or interfere in our investigation in some other way because I'm pretty sure I can interpret any action from you that I want as a direct assault of a federal officer and not worry about my superiors, because, as my partner here can verify, I have a superb record – isn't that right, Bones?"

"It's true. He really does," Brennan said in an unwavering, matter-of-fact tone.

"Yeah, see that, Martin? You've crossed the line with the wrong guy."

"Booth?"

"What is it, Bones?"

"There are two plates in the kitchen that look like remains from dinner."

"Guests for dinner, Martin? Gee, I'm sorry I missed them. This might have been even more entertaining."

Brennan walked further into the kitchen. "Oven is still warm," she called out.

For the first time since arriving, Booth noticed a slight change in Martin's expression. The slightest flicker of fear or worry? It rapidly moved into a hardened stare and the whole succession raised alarms in Booth's head. "Bones…can you find a mop or a broom or something like that and bring it out here?"

Booth was cuffing Martin as Brennan came in with a mop. Her hands were gloved from gathering evidence through bagging food and used glasses and utensils. Booth took the mop and pulled Martin up. Martin, in an unexpected display of anger, proceeded to spit on Brennan, who then returned the favor with a well-placed right hook into Martin's nose.

Martin gave a gasp of pain. "Nice one, Bones," Booth said appreciatively as he took the mop handle and jammed it between Martin's hands and back, then threaded it through a couple of the chairs in the dining room to help keep Martin in one place. He gave a well-placed knee into Martin's chest.

"That's a little extra something from me on behalf of my partner. I'm pretty sure you are familiar with where I am going to place this next punch-" Booth swung hard into his stomach, "—as you chose this spot for Marcus, didn't you? Pain, but less chance of lasting marks?" Booth gave him a final shove into the chairs before turning to Brennan, asking her to return his gun to him. She looked at him skeptically.

"I'm not going to shoot, him," he reassured her. "But we need to search this house. I don't know exactly what is up with the dinner dishes, but Martin's hiding something or—"

"—some_one_." She handed the gun back to him.

They checked the main floor, first. As Sweets and Angela had found it before, everything was precisely placed, but there was no evidence of anyone hiding or lurking anywhere. They entered Kenneth and Karen's bedroom and working on a shared theory, Booth searched Karen's closet and drawers while Brennan went into the master bathroom.

"Two empty hangers," Booth said to Brennan as she came back into the room.

"Both toothbrushes are damp," Brennan reported.

"Did you see any indication that Martin had entered or exited through the kitchen?" When Brennan shook her head, Booth led the way down to the basement with a glance to make sure Martin was still secure.

Heading down the stairs they heard faint voices. Booth gave Brennan a warning glance to stay behind him and they continued. The bottom of the stairs indicated a dim light and rounding the corner at the base they felt just a bit ill at what they saw. Booth did a quick scan and holstered his gun as Brennan had already made her way over to Karen Martin, who was strapped to a straightbacked wooden chair, impeccably dressed and made up, facing a computer monitor that seemed to be playing home movies of a younger Martin family. As there seemed to be two young boys, Booth guessed it was from several years ago, when the younger son, Christopher, was still alive and healthy.

The room was near bare. A lamp, which had been providing the dim light and a small foldable table were the only other furniture items visible aside from the desktop computer running the family scenes. Booth quickly shut it down and pulled out his phone to call in for a paramedic as well as a full FBI unit while Brennan tended to Karen, who was now sobbing in panic. Brennan spoke to her in soothing tones, trying to reassure Karen that they were there to help, that she was safe from Kenneth, and giving Booth one more reason to be grateful that she agreed to come with him.

"Oh God, is it true? Is Marcus dead? Did Kenneth kill him?"

Booth and Brennan exchanged a quick, painful glance before Booth replied gently, "Yes, it's true that Marcus is dead, but we're not sure yet what happened to him."

"It's my fault," Karen cried. "How could I let this happen? I should have gotten us away. I shouldn't have let Kenneth near Marcus anymore…"

"None of this is your fault," Booth said firmly. Upon closer inspection, in spite of her full make-up, styled hair, and neat attire, Karen was clearly a shell of what she had been. Her clothing hung loosely on her body and her eyes showed dark, heavy circles below them. Brennan asked Karen to move different body parts to assess any immediate damage.

A dragging noise from above their heads had Booth on his feet and starting towards the stairs.

"Booth," Brennan called out.

He turned to her and caught her expression with the unspoken question behind it. "Don't worry. I've got it under control." He gave her a reassuring look back, indicating that he wouldn't do anything rash.

Her eyes agreed with him and he ran up the stairs to verify that the dragging noise did not also mean Martin becoming mobile. He could hear sirens growing louder as he reached the top of the stairs and even though he had assured Bones that he would be alright, he was glad that he wouldn't be stuck alone with Martin for more than a minute, because the disgust he was feeling with him might very well encourage him to lose some of that control.

Walking into the dining room, he confirmed that Martin had only managed to slide himself forward a few inches. Martin looked over to Booth and still maintained a defiant expression. Booth merely narrowed his eyes at him as he shook his head, then went to meet his arriving team.

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Kenneth and Karen Martin's home had quickly become flooded with agents, forensics specialists, and paramedics. Booth handed off Kenneth Martin to other agents with the recommendation that Sweets interrogate him in the hopes that the young psychologist might have some luck getting any information out of the still tight-lipped man.

Brennan had done a convincing job of getting Karen Martin to accept an overnight stay in the hospital. Booth and Brennan had listened soberly to the details of Karen's painful story. Kenneth had suspected Karen to be involved with someone, but didn't know with whom. She'd had the gumption to say that she was planning on running away with him, taking Marcus with her. He'd retaliated to her revelation quickly, incapacitating her. She'd never made it to call in sick and by the end of the day, when Marcus didn't come home, Kenneth had gone off the deep end.

His obsessive nature kept her clothed and styled to perfection and his attentiveness to these details had frightened her deeply as he'd talk to her in a running commentary with odd stories about how their lives were going to be from now on. He blamed her for Marcus running away, as that was what he assumed happened and while he physically struck her occasionally with the idea that she would divulge where Marcus went, most of his torture had been psychological. He'd forced her to watch the home movies over and over again, to ingrain the anguish of their two lost sons.

She admitted to believing in Ron Gorman and felt that he would have helped them. Neither Booth nor Brennan had the heart to tell her otherwise. In the end, nothing could be gleaned from her story to indicate Kenneth Martin had anything to do with Marcus' murder, bringing them back to the foreman.

Booth and Brennan then visited the foreman, still at the construction site as they were trying to make up for lost time when shut down due to the murder investigation. It hadn't taken them long to bring about his confession.

"The kid was going to wreck this whole deal. I couldn't let something happen to it. Jeez, we've been out of work forever and finally this big project comes along and some thirteen-year old punk is going to derail the whole thing? Gorman had left, but I stopped the kid and he punched me in the nose. I got mad and shoved him and he fell back onto the shovel." He gestured toward the backhoe. "I didn't mean to kill him."

_**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**_

Booth and Brennan were finishing up their post-case drinks at the Founding Fathers. Sweets, Cam, Hodgins, and Angela had all recently left, leaving the two partners to contemplate where they were going to spend the rest of their evening.

Brennan put her hand around Booth's. He gave her a warm smile and looked into her eyes, which seemed to search his for something. "What?"

"I was thinking of different times during this case when personal experience has seemed to govern your actions and your investigative insights."

Booth resisted the urge to pull his hand away and resolutely held her gaze. He waited, knowing that she was headed somewhere, even if he didn't like where that somewhere landed him.

"You seem extremely reluctant to share these experiences with anyone."

Booth looked away. "I really don't like talking about it."

"I know."

He gave a half-hearted chuckle. "But?"

She tilted her head at him in that way that always made him catch his breath. "But… I know from experience that it actually does help to talk about those things. _You_ taught me that."

He placed his other hand on top of hers and ran his thumb along her cool, smooth skin. "Yeah, you're probably right."

"Booth? I'm not saying I think you should talk about it now, but will you talk to me about it someday?"

"Yeah," he said quietly. "Yeah, I will." And giving that verbal commitment, he knew he would follow through with it, but not just because he always kept his promises. Bones had been the only one who ever listened to everything about his past and responded to him honestly and not just with what she thought he wanted to hear. And at the end of the day, no matter what she thought, she still accepted him for who he was.

"C'mon. Let's head out. I'll take you home, and you can decide for us how our evening ends," Booth winked at her.

Instead of grabbing a cab right away, however, they walked together along the street in the cool evening weather, hand in hand.

"Will things get worked out regarding the child abuse and neglect issues with Rebecca?"

"Yeah, you know what? Remember the movie Angela made for Parker about the bike trick he was trying to do? Turns out, it proves how Parker broke his arm and with the ER doc's corroboration and a few character references, it should all be fine."

"Will you be able to find out if it was Kenneth Martin who gave the false report?"

Booth shook his head. "Probably not. But I think we both know that it was him, right?"

Brennan eyed him in a playful, calculating way, then leaned into him with a smile. "I suppose there is some evidence to support your gut on this one." In a more serious tone she continued, "Are things between you and Rebecca okay?"

He shrugged. "As okay as they ever are. Which means most of the time just fine, but other times it's a crapshoot on how we'll react to each other. Probably a good thing she turned down my marriage proposal way back when."

Brennan halted them in their walk at that moment and turned to him. "I do love you, Booth. You know that, right?"

If words alone could stop a heart from beating, his heart surely would have upon hearing the ones Bones spoke to him. "I…" He brought his hand up to her face and let his fingertips trace along her cheekbone and jawline. "Yes."

"When you came back from Afghanistan and told me about Hannah, I felt an unexpected sadness." Booth's face fell into deep regret as he looked down at their still joined hands.

"I'm sorry, Bones. I didn't plan on meeting Hannah. And I never would have thought I would fall in love with her."

"Of course you would. It's who you _are_ Booth. You find love everywhere. Love is ephemeral—"

"No, don't give me that line again. Love, real love, is _not_ ephemeral."

"You just said that you fell in love with Hannah. And you were in love with Rebecca. You wanted to marry Rebecca, proving that I am right. When you said you wanted 50 years with me, how could you possibly know, given this evidence? Love, as wonderful as it feels, is fleeting. And for two people like us, with so many differences in how we live our lives—"

"Look, I'm always going to be the gambler, right? That's who I am."

"And I'm always going to be the scientist, the one who needs evidence. That is who _I_ am."

"So what does science – anthropology – tell you about what will happen between us?"

She gave him that vulnerable moment, the emotion-filled eyes. He saw those eyes piece together an answer. "We will adapt."

"Right?" Booth gave her a hopeful smile. "And we are evolving, which we know takes a really, really, really long time, right?"

Brennan gave an involuntary smirk at his characterization of evolution. She looked at him with a deep desire to feel with him, to ride along with where he was trying to take them. "Yes. Hundreds of thousands of years."

"Then imagine our love as being ephemeral in the context of our evolution. That ends up being a pretty long time, doesn't it?"

"Booth, that really isn't possible."

"Ah, but then you are left with me telling you, once again, that I just _know_. I wasn't lying back when I said you are the standard. I couldn't make it work with Hannah because she wasn't _you_."

He released her hand and brought both of his to gently cup her face in them. Looking deeply into her eyes, his voice dropped. "Bones, when it comes right down to it, though, maybe you're right. Maybe our love isn't a lifetime. But I've learned that however long we do love each other is enough to last me _my_ lifetime. And that's enough for me."

Brennan's eyes filled with tears as she returned the warm kiss that confirmed his words. She pulled him in tightly and kissed him again with her own fiery agreement.

"Booth," she whispered. "I've decided how our evening will end."

He did not say anything, but merely smiled into her shining eyes, then led her to his car.

_**Thank you, as always, for gracing me with an audience. Thanks also to andreuuchis/angiebc for being my biggest cheerleader and Jen/jsq79 for her inspiring reviews and support. If you aren't reading their stuff, by the way, you really should be.**_


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